


Her Lord Marshal's Right Hand

by E_J_Frost



Series: Lords of Furya [1]
Category: Chronicles of Riddick (2004), Pitch Black (2000), The Chronicles of Riddick (2004), The Chronicles of Riddick Series
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-01
Updated: 2014-02-02
Packaged: 2018-01-10 18:26:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 23
Words: 129,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1163033
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/E_J_Frost/pseuds/E_J_Frost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Lord Marshal lies dead, but his First Concubine lives.  Will she follow her Lord Marshal and claim her Due Time, or can Riddick persuade her to choose Another Way?</p><p>Legal disclaimer: The characters who appear in "Pitch Black" and “The Chronicles of Riddick” belong to Universal Studios and their other various copyright owners.  I make no claim on them and do not intend to profit from the use of them in this work of fiction.  All other characters and settings are mine; kindly seek my permission if you plan to use them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Every day at sixteen-thirty, the Lord Marshal is to be bathed.

I kneel next to the bath, setting out the bathing implements in a neat row, and remember the words of my predecessor, Fainche.  Four years after her death, her instructions are still writ large in my mind.  They order my day, moment by moment.  Each task has become as natural to me as breathing.  As familiar as the cool weight of the Collar of the Whip set into my neck.

Sitting back on my heels, I wait for Zhylaw.  In only a few moments, he will stride through the huge doors.  I smooth my skirts in anticipation.  He’s been much occupied with the conquest of Helion these last few days.  So much so that he hasn’t even granted me leave to visit the surface and gather plant samples for my Garden, the way he usually does in the days after Descent.

Perhaps if he’s in a good mood today, I’ll ask.

I smooth my skirts again.  Over the rustle of cloth, my heartbeat sounds loud in my ears.  One beat, two.  My body, so attuned to the rhythm of his daily protocol, knows something is amiss before my mind registers it.

He’s late.

Slowly, I turn my head toward the chamber door, expecting to see it open.  He’s never late.  A perfectionist in all things, who demands perfection from all around him, he is punctual to the second.

The door remains closed. 

Worry ripples through me, making the small hairs of my body stand on end.  Another jolt, sharper.  An electric current burns down my spine.  Around my neck, my Collar goes ice cold.  Frost spreads through my blood, my bone.  My muscles tighten.  Shock sends me reeling back from where I kneel at the edge of the bath.  Sprawled on the marble floor, I look up, seeing not the familiar baths, but the ornate walls and pillars of the Necropolis.  A burning spike drives through my brain.  I stare up into the bestial glowing eyes of his killer.  I feel his horror at Vaako’s betrayal.  A scream, a wounded animal howl.  It rips through me like a sword, driving me to my feet.

Running, heedless of the eyes that follow me.  Heedless of the insult to my station.  Running through the Lord Marshal’s chambers, out onto the balcony above the Great Hall, to see the usurper Riddick step away from the still form of my Lord Marshal and stalk towards the Throne.

_Every day.  At sixteen-thirty.  The Lord Marshal.  Is to be bathed._

My Lord Marshal lies dead on the floor of the Great Hall.  I feel his death, True Death, like a hammerblow against my heart.  I grasp the carved stone balustrade to keep myself upright.  In my mind, there is only darkness.  No door opening, no dark glory that is the UnderVerse.  Nothing.

The Lord Marshal is dead.

And I . . . I have failed him.


	2. Chapter 2

The Riddick lifts the woman sprawled across the steps of the Throne; he cradles her in his arms and speaks to her.  His gravel baritone carries across the hall, over the heads of those assembled. 

“Are you with me, Kyra?” 

I cannot hear how she replies.  Then, whatever her answer, she is no longer with him.  Another who has died before her Due Time. 

The Riddick releases her gently, letting her slide onto the polished floor, and sits back on the Throne.

_The Lord Marshal is dead.  Long live the Lord Marshal._

The Traitor Vaako bows first, still holding the pole-arm he would have used against my Lord Marshal.  The rest of the assembled throng follow him.  The monster on the Throne does not react at first.  Perhaps, with his hand over his eyes, he does not see them.  But slowly, he stirs, and looks out over the kneeling multitude.

His words are quiet, but his deep voice carries.  “You keep what you kill.”

The Riddick looks up when I approach the Throne and put my slippered foot on the bottom step.  I have not kneeled.  I will not kneel.  He is no Lord Marshal.  He is an unholy Usurper who killed the true Lord Marshal through some breeder treachery.  And I will not kneel.

He seems in a fugue.  Impassive, his animal eyes track to me, roam over my face and down my form.  They take in my bared arms, the long, loose Robe of the Bath, so different from the fitted gowns of the courtiers who mill around the Great Hall, trying to come to terms with this sudden change of Regime.  Let them scheme and jostle for position.  I have one last duty.  And then I will claim my Due Time and follow my Lord Marshal. 

No expression registers on the monster’s face.  He looks at me, silver eyes hooded, face slack.  Whatever he thinks, he keeps to himself.

I bow my head, the most obeisance I can bring myself to make to him.

“Lord,” I begin.  The words curdle on my tongue and I cannot complete the title.  I want to spit at his feet to clear my mouth of the foulness of it. 

“Who’re you?”  That deep voice hits me like a sonic boom.  A forbidding sound.  I control a shudder.

“Ah, the First Concubine,” says the Traitor’s venomous bedmate, drawing up beside her lord where the commanders mill in a tight circle, their eyes on the Throne.  It is only a matter of time before one of them tries for it.  “Come to pledge your undying loyalty to the new Lord Marshal?”

I do not look at her, at any of them, but keep my eyes fixed on the dusty boots of the creature sprawled on the Throne.

“I am Liaden.  I request the honor—”

The Beast interrupts me.  “Concubine?  Interesting.”  His hooded eyes narrow, a mercuric flash, and I cannot hide a shudder this time.  “How many, _concubines_?”  He rolls the final word around on his tongue as though it is something to savor, something lavicious instead of a holy duty.

“Oh, there are four,” says Vaako’s snake sinuously.  As sinuous as her movement, unwinding herself from her lord’s side and sidling toward the Steps.  “But she is the First among them.  Isn’t that right, Liaden?”

She would know, since she tried to poison each of us, to promote us before our Due Time and take our place at the Lord Marshal’s side.  Only when she failed, twice in my case, did she lower her sights to the Traitor Vaako.

“I am, and I would request the honor—”

“Bring them here,” says the Beast.

I close my mouth with a snap.  He has no sense of propriety.  No decorum.  My Lord Marshal lies cooling on the floor and no one has given the holy Remains the respect they deserve.  Blood will tarnish the ceremonial armor, and . . .

“I said, bring them here.”

The Beast’s words, uttered in a growl, snap my attention back to him.  Raising my eyes, I see that he is no longer sprawled across the Throne.  He sits in it weightily, heavily.  The Throne’s majesty has touched even his unpurified heart.  He sits as a lord should, brooding and somber.

The obedience ingrained in me, welded into my heart the way the Collar of the Whip is welded into my neck, has me turning before I can stop myself.  I ball my hands into fists and force myself to a halt.  I will not kneel.

The true Lord Marshal lies cooling on the floor . . .

Gennica, Iloru and Aimi cluster behind me, a murder of crows in their tight black court gowns.  They kneel to the Beast, and when they rise, they stand with their eyes downcast, awaiting his pleasure.  I hiss at them.  Traitors, to kneel to our true Lord’s killer.  And Gennica and Iloru should have already taken the Knife for their failure to protect our Lord.

“You can go,” says the Beast from behind me.  Dismissing us.  I close my eyes in relief.  “Except,” he pauses and I turn to look at him.  And find one long, bloodstained finger leveled at me.  “You.”

I glare at him.  What does he mean, _except_ _me_?  Surely he does not expect me to serve him?  I am my Lord Marshal’s most faithful servant, and I will not kneel.

From the floor below me, Dame Vaako chortles.  “You didn’t think it would be that easy, did you, Liaden?”

I would give a great deal to be able to strike back at her.  But a Concubine holds herself above the petty machinations of the courtiers.  She shows favor to no one.  She shows disfavor to no one.  She is the Lord Marshal’s right hand in all things. 

“Lord, I request the honor—”

“Yeah, you said.”

“—of preparing Lord Zhylaw’s body for viewing and final interment,” I grit out.  My hands are balled into fists again, and the Beast should count himself lucky that I am gowned for the bath instead of wearing the vestments of my Station.  The Beast must be quick, or he would not have bested my Lord Marshal, no matter what breeder trickery he used.  But speed alone cannot overcome the arsenal of weapons I wear when I stand at my Lord’s right hand.  A nightshade dart would put out the light in those demonic silver eyes.

The Beast’s mouth twitches, and the silver eyes glimmer.  He dares?  He dares find me amusing?  He dares mock my duty and my devotion?

“Yeah,” he says slowly.  He draws his fingers across his mouth, smearing the blood there.  “But first take care of me.”

 

He is weak.  He is Living.  He bears numerous injuries from his battle with my Lord Marshal.  The worst is a purpling band across his throat, the flesh still indented from the force of whatever weapon made it.

“This needs healing,” I say quietly, touching his throat with my fingertip, under cover of sponging blood off his neck, to avoid revealing the extent of his injury to those below.  My own complicity takes me by surprise.  I owe him nothing.  He is nothing.  But I owe nothing to the traitors who mill around us, either.  They call themselves Necromongers, but they are not True.  They have let this impostor sit on the Throne.  They have knelt to him and called him their Lord.

He watches them intently, eyes flicking over their thinning numbers.  Most of the commanders remain.  Vaako.  Toal.  Scales.  Scalp-Taker.  The gilded Snake lingers, twisting around her lord.  Aimi also remains, kneeling on the step below the Throne, holding the bowl of antiseptic liquid that I use to cleanse the Beast’s wounds.  The white-robed Elemental still lurks in the shadows of a balcony.  The Beast’s eyes flick to her, and away.  I would not have expected him to be aware of her.  I am only because her alien presence disturbs this sanctum.

As does his.

“This needs—” I begin again when he seems to ignore me.

“I heard you,” he says quietly.  His throat works and I can see that it pains him, although he keeps his reaction to an invisible flinch that I feel only through my fingers.  “Wait.”

Wait?  Wait as my Lord’s body waits?

A stirring in the crowd.  The Beast leans forward on the Throne, brushing me to one side.  I draw back a step, and move automatically to my customary position against the right armrest.

Commander Toal’s dark eyes flick to me, and beyond me, as he puts one foot on the bottom step of the Throne.  It is not my Station to know or care about the politics of the Lord Marshal’s court.  But if it were, I would have said that the Beast had little to fear from Toal.  His loyalty to the Lord Marshal was blind, and his adherence to the Creed unswerving.  Toal knelt to the Beast, so in his narrow mind, the Beast is his new Lord Marshal.

The Beast seems to intuit this, his low breeder instincts serving him well.  His eyes shift to the group still clustered around Vaako.  When none of them step forward, his rigid posture relaxes slightly.

“Your orders, my Lord?” Toal asks.

“My orders?”  The Beast ponders this, seemingly lost in introspection for a moment.  Then he chuckles, a cruel sound that holds no amusement.  It is oddly fitting to this place and time.  “Take us to the Threshold.”

His words, carried clearly throughout the Great Hall on that bass rumble, elicit gasps and stifled exclamations.  Vaako finally steps out of his cluster of cronies, the butt of the pole-axe he still carries clanging on the floor.

“The Threshold?  The People are not prepared.  They have not been purified and do not know the Way.  This Verse still crawls with Life . . .”

“You questioning my order?”

The Beast’s voice is soft, but the menace of it is clear.  This is what he has been waiting for.  Having me attend him was a diversion.  A shield behind which he could watch Vaako and the other commanders.  Behind which he could wait until they made their move.  A cunning Beast, this one.

Vaako stands irresolute.  Were it not beneath my Station, I would sneer at him.  He lacks the intestinal fortitude to be a traitor.  His Dame spurred him into one betrayal, but whatever poison she has been whispering to him while I have cleaned the Beast’s wounds, it is not enough to propel him into a second.  He is weak.  He will never sit on the Throne.  May he die before his Due Time.

My eyes slide from Vaako’s sweating frown to the still form on the floor behind him.

_Every day.  At sixteen-thirty.  The Lord Marshal.  Is to be bathed._

The Lord Marshal has missed his bath.  The protocol has been broken.  My life, so finely ordered and timed around that protocol, has been broken.  The Lord Marshal’s body lies cooling on the floor . . . . and these traitors snarl over the scraps he has left behind. 

“No, my Lord Marshal,” Vaako says finally.

“Good.  Then get the fleet underway.”  The Beast slumps back into the Throne, brooding and silent once again.

His words disperse the remaining crowd.  The commanders move off towards the control room.  The snake slithers away, casting venomous glances at both her departing mate and the Throne.

The Beast rolls his head against the Throne’s high back.  His quicksilver eyes pin me, but not before I see the fatigue and pain around them.

Wounded.  Living.  Mortal.

“Now you can get me a healer.”

I turn and nod at Aimi.  “Bring Master Tomoetu.”  I glance back at the Beast.  He sits on the Throne, and I have my duty.  “Quietly.  Through the Lord Marshal’s Walk, not the main corridors.”

She bows her shaved head, hands me the bowl and glides away.  Of all the concubines, Aimi has always shown the most dignity, the most respect for our station.  I am sorry to lose her, now that the Beast has dismissed her.  But she will go to Toal, I suspect.  I have seen the way they look at each other, despite her duty and his devotion.  Now that she is free, she will make Toal a fine companion, in this Verse and the next.

I have no intention, however, of living to see their union.

Tucking the bowl under my arm, I move back in front of the Throne and finish cleaning the lacerations on the side of the Beast’s neck.  Only his battered face remains.  I have avoided his face, not wanting to look at him so closely, touch him so intimately.  But that is all that is left, and I do not shrink from my duty.

The Beast watches me closely as I lean over him and press the cloth against his chin.

“How long were you with him?” he asks, his voice slightly muffled by the cloth.

“Four years.”

The Beast’s eyes slide past me, and return.

“Before that?”

“Before that I was an unenlightened worm, crawling through the slime with all the other worms, writhing in a morass of my own filth and pain . . .”

The Beast looks away.  “Spare me the recruiting speech.  I heard it already.”

I press the cloth against a deep split in his lip in the hopes that that will silence him.  His blasphemy thickens the air, makes it rank with more than the stink of blood.

When I remove the cloth, the bleeding has stopped.  I sponge blood away from a gash above one glowing eye.  That wound has already stopped bleeding on its own.  He is as clean as I can make him without a proper bath.

Every day.  At sixteen-thirty.  The Lord Marshal.  Is to be bathed.

“Aimi will bring the healer,” I say, dropping the bloody cloth into the bowl on my hip.  There is blood on my hand.  On the edge of my robe where I must have brushed the cloth against it.  Careless.  I will have to change and purify myself again before I tend to the holy Remains.  “If you will allow me—”

“You stay,” the Beast rumbles.  “Until I tell you to go.” 

I plant my hand on my other hip and glare at him.  “I am of no further use here and there is much to be done to prepare my Lord Zhylaw’s—”

A small smile shapes the Beast’s mouth.  A mobile mouth, surprisingly expressive for one who expresses so little.  “He’ll keep,” the Beast says.  His eyes drop to the other body, lying close to the base of the Throne.  “I want her taken care of, too.”

I glance back at the other body.  A new initiate.  The purification marks on the side of her neck are still raw.  Insignificant, beside what lies near her.

“She has been purified.  If her body is taken to the Threshold, her soul will still find peace in the UnderVerse—”

His hand shoots out, grabbing the front of my robes and yanking me forward so that my face is only millimeters from his. 

“Don’t,” he growls.  “Ever.  Talk.  That.  Fucking.  Bullshit.  About.  Her.”

He releases me and I stumble back a step before I can recover.  I smooth my robes, wiping at the stain bleeding pink down my hip from the sloshing bowl.  When I have regained my dignity, I look at him levelly.  “The sooner you let me leave, the sooner I can turn my attention to her.”

“Go,” he growls.

I pivot, careful to hold the bowl steady and to pick up my skirts with my free hand before I descend the set of steps to the floor of the Great Hall.

As I walk past the girl’s body, his growl makes me pause.

“Before you take care of them, bring me something to eat.”

A low Beast.  Consumed by his own fleshy needs.  Without any proper respect for the Dead.  He should fast for three days, as is proper after such a Death.  As I will fast.

And then I will follow my Lord.

 

When I return, followed by the Lord Marshal’s own chef and a floating pallet laden with the best he could prepare on such short notice, the healer Tomoetu and one of his acolytes attend the Beast.  I lead Chef past the bloodstains on the floor.  As I directed on my way to the galley, the bodies of my Lord Marshal and the girl have been removed to the Lord Marshal’s chambers, where I will bathe my Lord Marshal a final time and see that all proper Rites are given him before his body is interred in the Hall of Waiting.  The Beast has ordered the Armada to the Threshold.  Perhaps my Lord’s wait will not be long.

When I reach the base of the Throne, I step aside to let Chef steer the banquet in front of the Beast.  From his gestures and the state of the Beast’s throat, I can see that Tomoetu has almost finished.  I bow to Tomoetu’s acolyte, and hand him a small urn of Bella Dust that I have collected from the Lord Marshal’s private reserve.  It is customary to give a gift for a healing.  And I have no doubt that the Beast will not observe the proprieties. 

The Beast’s eyes flicker over me, a quicksilver flash.

“You changed.”

I fold my hands, half-gloved now in my customary day dress, over the front of my long skirt.  “It was not proper for me to wear the bathing robe outside of the Lord Marshal’s chambers.  Forgive me.”  The apology grates.  I will not kneel.

The amused mockery I saw before returns to his lips, his eyes.  He dares . . .?

“If the Lord will excuse me?” I ask, indicating with a gray-gloved hand the chamber above the Great Hall where the Dead await me. 

“Where’re you going?”

“To attend the Dead.”

“Told you before, they’ll keep.  Feed me first.”

I clench my jaw to keep from snapping at him and disgracing my station.  Cruel amusement widens his mocking smile.  He’s baiting me.  Keeping me from my true duty by forcing me to perform a false one.  An evil Beast.

I lift my skirts so that I can step up to the Throne.  Chef has positioned the pallet directly in front of him.  Within easy reach once Tomoetu moves aside.  He no more needs me to feed him than he needed me to tend his wounds.

Resting my hands between a tray of savory meats and a finely wrought pitcher of Cark, I lean over the table toward him and ask softly, “Are you a child that you must be fed?”

His evil smile widens until it shows white teeth.  “I’m your Lord Marshal.  Who just commanded you.  To feed me.”

A monstrous Beast.  A Beast who sits on my Lord Marshal’s Throne as though it were truly his own and dares keep me from my duty for his own petty amusement.  A Beast who deserves one of the nightshade darts hidden in the false sleeves that trail from my elbows nearly to the ground.  Or the deathshead pins that stiffen my gown’s collar.  Or even the Concubine’s weapon of last resort, never used since the founding of Necropolis, never revealed even to the Lord Marshal, but passed down from First Concubine to First Concubine in secret, the tiny Rift disguised as a jewel in the clasp that holds up my hair.

All to be used only against the Lord Marshal’s enemies, and only in his defense.  And never, never wielded against the man who sits on the Throne of Necropolis.  That is the Concubine’s first and most sacred vow.  _To honor and obey the Lord Marshal, in life, in death, ‘til UnderVerse come._

He is no true Lord Marshal.  But he does sit on the Throne.  I cannot use my weapons against him.  And I cannot refuse to serve him.  It is my duty, and I will do it.

But he is a low Beast.  And perhaps I have other weapons, which are not forbidden, which, if not as effective, will at least wipe that irritating smile off his face.

“Very well,” I say.  I wait while the healer and Chef make their nervous obeisances and depart.  Then I climb into my accustomed place, the wide flange of the Throne’s seat that extends beyond the right armrest.  Out of long habit, I kneel there before I catch myself.  A glance at the Beast shows that I am too late to correct my mistake.  His eyes gleam.  Silver on water.

Ignoring his amusement, I pick up the bowl nearest me.  A ceremonial bowl included with all of the Lord Marshal’s meals, but never consumed.  A bowl of ash and paste, symbolizing the meaninglessness of food once True Death has been obtained.

Rolling a pinch of the bowl’s contents into a ball between my finger and thumb, I offer it to him.  Let us see how amusing he finds the Manna of the Dead.

His eyes drop to the ball, and then rise to my face.  “Think I’ll save that for last.  How ‘bout some of the Aquilian anchovies I saw over there.  Haven’t had one of those in years.”

Disappointing.  But that was only one weapon, and there’s always later, even for that one.  “As the Lord wishes.”

As I replace the bowl and reach for the platter of salted fish, he says, “Not _your_ Lord.”

I busy myself with spearing some of the small fish on a pronged fork so that I do not have to meet those disconcerting eyes.  “What is that, Lord?”

“You never say ‘my’ Lord, like the others.”

A perceptive Beast.  I’ll have to be careful around him. 

I hold out the skewered fish, but instead of taking the fork from me, he opens his mouth.

The temptation to ram the sharp prongs into the back of his throat, or even to try for the more difficult wound, up through the soft palate and into the brain, is overwhelming.

_Never against the man who sits on the Throne of Necropolis._

My hand shakes, but I grit my teeth and force it steady.  I place the fish in his mouth and draw the fork gently back between his teeth when he closes them.

He chews, swallows.  “More.”

I oblige him, feeding him three skewers of fish before he points to a tray of roasted meat.

“So?” he asks while I’m cutting the dark slices of meat into even smaller slivers to feed to him.

“So?” I echo.  If I dance around his questions, perhaps he’ll tire of asking them and eat quickly, and in silence.

“So why not _my_ Lord?”

“Some are quicker to accept change than others,” I say, hoping to deflect him with vagueness.

He refuses to be deflected.  “Didn’t see you down on the floor with the others.” 

“I was up there.”  I wave my hand at the balcony.  Merely thinking about that moment, the moment where my people betrayed their Faith and their fallen Lord, brings back a surge of rage and grief so strong it closes my throat.

“But were you kneeling?  Up there?”

His voice is soft, the same tone he used with Vaako.  It sends a chill down my metal-inset spine.  I cannot avoid answering, but I cannot reveal the truth, either.  If he sends me from him, strips me of my Station, then I will have failed in my duty and the UnderVerse will be forever closed to me.  I cannot fail my Lord Marshal.

I swallow hard.  “Did you not see me, Lord?  Could your all-seeing eyes not pick me out among the multitudes?”

He chuckles.  “Guess not.”

I smile, a baring of teeth that would do a cornered lupinarus proud.  “Then let me assure you, Lord.  I gave you all due honor and deference.”

That seems to amuse him greatly, for he gives a harsh, cawing laugh.

“I bet you did.”  He accepts a mouthful of meat.  “That’s a little dry,” he says, chewing.  He nods when I dip the meat into an oily sauce.  “Better.”

While he chews another mouthful, I pour him some of the Cark.  Much of the food the Chef has prepared comes from the conquered world below us.  But Cark is a Necromonger delicacy.  Perhaps it will choke him.  I can but hope. 

When I offer him the goblet of Cark, his nostrils flare, and he takes a deep breath.  Scenting?  He is a Beast, after all.

But whatever he smells does not offend him.  He does not suspect.  He nods and lifts his chin.  He drinks when I hold the goblet to his lips, his strong, healed throat working.

He lifts a hand and I tilt the goblet back.  A trickle of the black cordial runs down his chin.  Careless.  I blot it quickly.

The Beast licks his lips as though savoring the Cark’s taste.  Surely it is vinegar in his mouth?  Acid in his throat?

“Tart,” he says.  “How ‘bout some of that fruit?”

I put the goblet down.  It is an effort not to slam it on the banquet table in frustration.

Chef has provided a set of the Lord Marshal’s own Requiem spoons for the dish of spiced fruits the Beast indicates.  No, I will not let the Requiem spoons touch the Beast’s lips.  They are Holy, passed down from Covu the Transcended himself.

I pick up the pronged fork I used for the fish.

The Beast’s eyes track my movement.  “Rather have it on one of those spoons,” he says. 

I grip the fork tightly to keep my hands from shaking.  Damn him.  Those animal eyes see too much.

I reach for one of the Requiem spoons and his hand shoots out.  He grabs my wrist.

He runs his fingers down the edge of my trailing sleeve, where a set of darts sit imbedded in the hem, each small head protruding like a dark jewel.

“What’re these?”

He is no true Lord Marshal.  He has no right to know.

“Decorations,” I force out.

With two long fingers he plucks one out of its tiny sheath.  He holds the dart up between us, turning it between his fingertips.  A drop of the dart’s venom glitters crystalline on its tip.

“Wouldn’t want to scratch myself with this, would I?”

Oh, please.  Please. 

He slides the dart back into its place in my sleeve.

“That fruit comin’?”

Shaking with frustration, I scoop up some of the fruit and tip it into his mouth, trying to keep the holy spoons from touching his unPurified flesh.

He sits back, chewing.  Around his mouthful, he says, “So.  What’s a First Concubine do?”

A mannerless Beast.  To speak with his mouth full.  I look away so that I do not have to see how his thick, vile tongue moves the pulp around in his mouth.

“I serve the Lord Marshal.”  Hoping to distract him, I offer him another mouthful of fruit.

He takes it, but is not distracted.  I must beware his focus.  “How?”

“In all ways.  I tend to the needs of his body.”

“Yeah?”  Mercuric amusement slides through his eyes again.  Then he glances at my sleeve.  “With those things?”

I am grateful that he does not know of the Pins in my collar or the Rift in my hair.

“No,” I say, scooping up more fruit.

“Then what’re those for?”

I grit my teeth.  If he were a true Lord Marshal, he would not need to ask.  He would know my station as well as he knows his own.  But he is an unbeliever.  An unbeliever sitting on the Throne of the Necromongers.  Unthinkable.

“They are to be used in the defense of the Lord Marshal,” I say finally, telling him no more than he could learn from the most novice purifier.

“Really?  Hmm.  More of that wine.”

I hold the goblet for him, tilting it more carefully this time, so that not a precious drop spills.

“So you’re my bodyguard.”

I would be his assassin, if not for my duty.  “Yes, Lord.”

“Anythin’ else?”

Concubines have been many things to the Lord Marshals they have served.  Covu the Transcended’s gave him children.  Unimaginable, now.  But such are the evolutions of the Faith.  Oltovm’s helped him build Asylum and the Armada, and saved him from Daguan the Despised, who would have ended Oltovm’s rule before his Due Time.  Naphemil’s were the first to be Purified, their sacrifice showing the way for all to follow, even though they failed to protect him from Baylock.  Baylock’s were the first to wear the Collar of the Whip, and the first to chose ritual suicide on the untimely death of their Lord.

_A Concubine cannot fight her Lord Marshal’s battles.  Only protect him from a knife in the back_.

_And die with him at his Due Time._

I give him the most meaningless answer I can think of.  “A Concubine serves as her Lord wishes.  At his will and by his command.”

The Beast’s eyes wander towards the corner where the Commanders stood a short time ago.  “Same way Dame Vaako serves hers?”

I cannot control a sneer.  He compares my holy duty with the connivings of that rutting Snake?

“There is little comparison, Lord.”

He smiles and tips his chin at the fruit.  “I figure she put him up to it.  Don’t you?”

I spoon more of the fruit into his mouth.  “It is not my place to speculate on the motivations of the Lord’s commanders.  Or their companions.”

“No?”

“A Concubine holds herself above all others.  Devoting herself to her lord and her lord alone, ‘til UnderVerse come.”

The Beast chuckles around the fruit.  “Maybe I shoulda kept the other three.  Never had four women devoted to me before. 

He does not have one woman devoted to him now.  Egotistical Beast.

“So you don’t follow the game.”  He shrugs.  “Coulda used your help figuring out the next play.”

I bite my lips.  Withholding knowledge is a dereliction of my duty.  “I must know enough about the Court to anticipate any danger to my Lord Marshal’s person,” I say grudgingly.

The Beast grunts and gestures to the goblet of Cark.  After I hold it for him, he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand – crude Beast – and waves it away.  “That’s enough,” he says.  “I’m not used to eating so much at once.”

So much?  He has barely eaten enough for a child.  He will fare poorly at the banquet they will no doubt hold for him tonight.  A banquet I should be planning.

I start to rise, to return the pallet to the galley and finally, finally attend to my true duty.  But the Beast catches my wrist again.

“Where you goin’?”  His fingers squeeze up my wrist.  “What’s this?”

The blow-pipe for the nightshade darts lies against the long tendon of my wrist, beneath his crushing fingers.

I hold my wrist out to him, flexing it so that he can see the tiny slit in my glove, and the hollow pipe concealed within.

“Mmm.  Blade’s quicker.”

“But not always as sure at a distance for small targets.”

Those shining eyes, for example.

“You must have good aim.”  He releases my wrist.  “So.  Tell me about Vaako.” 

“He is a Commander.  Until today he was responsible for the lensor teams.”

“Until today?” 

“My Lord . . . Lord Zhylaw promoted him to First among Commanders.  For his diligence in lensing you out and cleansing you.”

The Beast smiles.  “Lucky for me he wasn’t all that diligent.”

My jaw clenches in anger and it is an effort to keep my breathing steady.  An effort the Beast sees with a flash of those glacial eyes.  His humor forces words out of my mouth when I should remain silent.  “Vaako failed in his duty, and betrayed . . .”  I trail off, unable to complete the thought without betraying myself.

“My predecessor?”  The Beast sounds amused again.

“Yes.”

“Mmm.”  He shifts on the Throne, flexing massive shoulders under a common legionnaire’s breastplate that does not fit him well.  Not even my Lord Marshal’s armor will fit those shoulders.  He looks uncomfortable, and the Lord Marshal’s comfort is my duty.

But he is not my Lord Marshal, and I will not offer him more comfortable clothes.

Even such a small dereliction of my duty grates on me.  The Collar imbedded in my neck burns slightly.  No, I must be imagining that.  The Collar only responds to a true Lord Marshal.

“What should I do with him?”

He asks me?  “Failure is punished by death before Due Time.” 

All failures.  Even small ones.  “Lord,” I say slowly.  “Can I bring you more comfortable attire?”

The Beast flexes his shoulders again.  “Think I’ll hold on to this for now.”  He grins suddenly.  “In case anyone gets any ideas about advancin’ me before my due time.”

A wary Beast.  Intelligent in the way that some animals are intelligent.  But a far cry from the subtle brilliance of my fallen Lord.  How, how then, did this Beast defeat him?

“So they’ll expect me to kill him.”  The Beast looks thoughtful, rubbing his lower lip between his thumb and forefinger.  The motion splits the newly formed scab there and a smear of fresh red appears on his thumb.  The Beast appears not to notice.

“Lord?”  I motion to his hand.  He holds it out to me and seems genuinely surprised to see the blood before I blot it away with a clean cloth.

“I could get used to this,” he grumbles.  “How ‘bout some more of that wine?”

I hold the goblet again for him and while he drinks, I say, “Carkarus.  Elixir of the Dead.”

He motions the cup away.  “Mmm.  Strong.  Think I’ll stick to tea.”

Chef has included the Lord Marshal’s chased and filigreed chai service on the banquet pallet.  I rise, collect it from the far corner of the floating table, and return to my place.  I hold out the Tray of Leaves, with its many silver bowls containing different mixtures.  I offer it to him with my head bowed, as is proper.  The Beast takes his time over the tray, lifting several bowls to his nose and sniffing their contents.  Finally he selects one.  Verydian Green.  A good, mellow choice after a large meal.  I should have given him the Mandorecki Gold, in the hopes of overstimulating his sensitive stomach.

Next time.

He watches me make the tea, his intense scrutiny turning my practiced movements clumsy.  My Lord Marshal never watched me so.  He knew the place of those around him.  Knew I would do my duty without supervision.  The Beast has no such confidence.  Or perhaps such service is new to him.  Lending my ear to the courtier gossip is beneath my station.  But if I had, their whispers after the Beast escaped the chamber of the Quasi Dead would have told me nothing more than unfounded speculations.  The rumor that he is Furyan is surely too far-fetched to be true.  But where does he come from?  What has his life been like to this point that so little food fills his belly?  That a woman making him tea is a novelty? 

I offer him the tea, expecting him to open his mouth as he did for the Cark.  But he takes the crystal and silver teacup from my hands, sips from it appreciatively, and then holds it in his lap.

“How long’s Vaako been a commander?”

“I do not know, Lord.  He has held that station since I came to the Basilica.  But . . .” I pause.  It is not my duty to speculate, only to tell the Lord Marshal what he needs to know.

“Yeah?” 

And to answer any question he puts to me.  “His union with Dame Vaako is not three years old.  And she would not have joined with him until he became a commander.”  And until she failed in her attempts to kill off a Concubine and take her place beside my Lord Marshal.  “So perhaps not so long before I came.”

“And that was four years ago.”

“Yes, Lord.”

“And he’s been loyal until now.”  It is only half a question.  Half a conclusion that he has already come to.

“I believe so.  My Lord—”  I bite my lips.  I must be careful.  I must remember.  “—Lord Zhylaw reposed some measure of trust in Vaako.  And he trusted no man.”

The Beast tilts his head, looking at me measuringly.  “He trusted a woman, though.”

I busy myself setting the chai server to rights.  I will answer the Beast’s questions about the court because it is my duty.  But my duty does not extend to answering questions about what was between my Lord Marshal and his First Concubine.

“Mmm.”  The Beast sips his tea, the sound of his consumption loud in the silent chamber.  At least he knows how to appreciate fine tea.  “Think I’ll have a word with each of them.  See who rattles.”

He seems to be thinking aloud, talking more to himself than to me, but it would be rude not to respond.  “Yes, Lord.”

He says nothing more, but his disconcerting eyes track to me.  I should have remained silent.  Casting around for something to dislodge his unwanted attention, I motion to the control panel set into the left arm of his chair.  “This lens summons the control room.  Speak near the lens and they will hear you.”  I reach across him to indicate the correct lens.

As I withdraw, his big hand closes on my wrist again, a gesture that is becoming uncomfortably familiar.  My Lord Marshal never touched me so.  Never touched me at all.

“Which one summons you?”

Were he a true Lord Marshal, he would merely have to think of me and the Collar would call me to him.  But he is not.  He is nothing but a usurper who has no right to the Throne he sits on.

I point to the lens for the Lord Marshal’s private chambers.  “That one.  If I am not there, the Guardian of the Chamber will know where to find me.”

But only for two more days.

The Beast inspects the control panel for a moment, then sits back in the Throne and rubs his gloved fingers over his eyes.

“How do I turn down the lights in here?”

I place my fingers on my Collar, my link with the Basilica and the man who rules it.  When the Collar pulses cool under my fingers I say, “Lights dim.”

The Great Hall descends into twilight.

The Beast sighs as though with relief.  Does bright light hurt his strange eyes?

“What’re the names of the commanders?” 

“Vaako.  Toal.  Scales.  And Scalp-Taker, Lord.”  He will need to name a new Purifier Principal, but that is information for another time.

The Beast passes his hand over the command chamber lens and says, “Send me Toal.”

“Yes, Lord Marshal,” comes the disembodied response.

I gather my skirts to rise.  Surely he will want the remains of his meal cleared away before he meets with his commanders.  And while he does, I can, at last, attend to my true duty.

“Did I say you could go?” he asks, his tone low with both amusement and menace.

His words slam me back down onto my knees.  I bow my head so that he cannot see the fury and hatred in my eyes.

“No, Lord.”

“Then stop jumpin’ up every time you think I’m not payin’ attention.”

“I merely wanted to—” 

“Thought you served at my will and by my command.”

Never!  How can he turn such banal information to such evil ends?  How dare he keep me from my true duty?  My Lord Marshal’s sacred Remains lie waiting, his blood staining his armor, and no one attends him.  The urge to run, run from this monster and his wicked games, is so strong I shake with it.

“Yes, Lord.”

“Good.  Sit and listen.  When I’m done talkin’ to each of them, tell me what you think.  And if I miss somethin’ important, start makin’ me another cup of tea.”

Wicked games.  Incomprehensible demands.  Another cup of tea?  Ah.  A ruse.  A signal.  Another shield for him to hide behind.  “Very well.”

I rearrange my skirts while we await Toal, smoothing them so they are without wrinkle.  My Lord Marshal required an artful exterior.  Cultivated.  Perfect.  The Beast, slumped on the Throne in his borrowed, bloodstained armor, doubtless does not care.  But perhaps my Lord Marshal will look back at me from the Threshold and smile.

What would he say, my fallen Lord, of the small services I have performed for his slayer?  What did Nephemil, third of the Lords Marshal, think of Danior, his First, when she knelt to his murderer?  Our histories do not record that.  Nephemil was denied the Threshold by Baylock, and so his thoughts died with him, on the floor of this very Hall.

But the Concubines’ histories record what Danior thought.  Her horror at kneeling to the man who had killed her Lord.  Her madness when Baylock claimed her as his Second and put the Collar of the Whip on her.  She chose death before her Due Time to escape him.

What would my Lord Marshal want of me?  To kneel to the Beast?  To honor him as the others have done?  Surely not.

Toal’s footfalls ring on the hard stone of the hall, drawing me out of my reverie.

“My Lord Marshal,” he says, advancing to the foot of the Throne and kneeling.  When the Beast says nothing, Toal rises and stands squarely.  Solid, stolid and unimaginative, but loyal to the man who sits on the Throne.

“We on the way?” the Beast asks, a low rumble that echoes up from the cavern of his chest.

Confusion crosses Toal’s hewn features.  “No, my Lord.  We await your command for Final Protocol.”

The Beast’s eyes flick to me.  Is that a sign?  Am I to begin making tea?  I lean forward, putting my body between the Beast and his commander, and pick up the chai whisk.

“What’s final protocol?” the Beast murmurs.

Does he know _nothing_ of the Way?  “Destruction of the conquered world and any who remain unconverted,” I whisper as quietly as I can, busily stirring a measure of Gauvray Black under a stream of boiling water.  Good for calming the nerves, Gauvray Black.  I need it if he does not.

The Beast holds out his cup.  The fresh tea will not mix well with the remains of his Verydian Green.  I hastily prepare a new cup and take the old from him.

“New protocol,” the Beast says when I sit back in my place and smooth my skirts.  “Straight to the Threshold.  Forget about Helion.” 

Toal’s face displays as much shock as his unrefined features are capable of.  “My Lord?”

“You heard me.”

Toal straightens.  “Yes, my Lord.”

The Beast leans forward, setting his untasted tea on the banquet table and steepling his fingers.

“Vaako was first among commanders,” he says. 

Toal’s eyes shutter, but not before a flicker of disgust passes through them.  “Yes, my Lord.”

“Now you are."

Toal gapes at this unexpected bounty, then remembers himself and drops to one knee.  “Thank you, my Lord Marshal.”

“Send Scales to me.”

The Beast sits back, silent and brooding once more, while Toal bows his way out.  I keep my eyes downcast, as is proper, but my mind is whirling.  He knows _nothing_ of our ways.  Nothing at all.  Not even the basic contours of the Campaign.  And yet he sits on the Throne as though he would hold it.  He recognizes loyalty, even dumb, blind loyalty such as Toal’s, and rewards it.  With Toal behind him, he will be harder to remove from the Throne.  If he can sway one of the other commanders, perhaps impossible.

Scales is the most likely to be swayed.  His is a fanatical devotion to the Faith.  An unreasoning hatred for the Unconverted.  That the Beast has ordered the Armada to the Threshold without finishing the Campaign will not sit well with Scales.  But there is something which could appease him.

I could tell the Beast this.  Hand him the power to hold the Throne.

But he is a Beast.  Unholy.  Unpurified.  Full Live.

The faithless ones who bowed to him, who knelt and called him Lord Marshal, deserve no better.  And I have my duty to the man who sits on the Throne.  If only for two more days.

“Scales will object to this new protocol,” I say quietly.  “He will resent leaving Helion behind unconquered, the work there unfinished.”

The Beast inclines his head toward me, listening.

“But Scales hates nothing so much as the Faithless.  And none are so faithless as the Galinites.  Fayolan sector.  Uni-Versalists.  Lord Zhylaw promised Scales that he could lead the attack on the Galin homeworlds personally, after we finished with Helion and the rest of Eigenus sector.  Galin is not so far from the portal to the Threshold.  Barely even out of our way . . .”

The Beast makes a low sound.  It could be acceptance or objection; I cannot tell.

“Or there is Scalp-Taker.  But his loyalty is not so easily assured.  My Lord Zhylaw did not doubt him so long as there were unconverted to slay.  If you deny him that by taking us straight to the Threshold . . .”

“I see,” the Beast says, so low I can barely hear him.

I sit back on my heels, only then becoming aware of leaning towards him while we have spoken.

“I’m gonna need to fight one of them,” he murmurs.

“Vaako,” I whisper.  He is a Traitor, but so are they all.  That is not what makes me name him.  “He is uncertain.  Perhaps remorseful.  He will hesitate at the crucial moment.  The others will not.”

The Beast rumbles deep in his throat.

The sound of footsteps.  Scales. 

The Beast lays his gloved hand over mine, where mine lingers on the armrest.

“Liaden.”  It is the first time he has used my name.  It is a shock to hear it in that abyssal rumble.  The sound shivers down my spine.

I bow my head.  “Yes, Lord.” 

“You can go.”

He’s releasing me? 

I slide from my perch before I further question my good fortune, or before he can change his mind.  I make a hasty, bobbing obeisance at the base of the Throne, and am half-way across the room before I realize the why of it.

He rewards loyalty.

My hands tighten into such furious fists that by the time I have reached the Lord Marshal’s chambers, my fingernails have cut into my palms, and I have to purify myself all over again before I can begin to serve the Dead.


	3. Chapter 3

The Servants of the Chamber are well trained.  They know better than to disturb me at such an important duty as tending the Dead.

So I look up in shock, and in disgust, when Tiguan, Guardian of the Chamber, bursts through the door to the Chamber of the Bath where I am sponging blood from the body of the dead girl.

“The Lord Marshal is wounded,” he announces.

The Lord Marshal is dead.

Uncomprehending, I put down my sponge and rise to face him.  “What—?”

“In the Great Hall.  He calls for you.”

The Guardian of the Chamber will know where to find me, I told him.  The Chamber of the Bath is a sanctum.  Sealed and soundproofed.  I did not hear his call.

I run for the Great Hall for the second time today.

The Beast sits on the Throne where I left him.  Much else has changed.  The hover table is overturned.   Its contents spill across the inlaid floor in a riot, black fingers of Cark spreading through jumbled mounds of meat and fruit.  The Lord Marshal’s chai set has fallen across the steps of the Throne.  At least one of the precious crystal cups has smashed, strewing the steps with shards that glitter like tears.

Vaako lies on the floor a few steps from the Throne.  He is bloodied.  His helm lies some meters distant, against the base of a column, and he bleeds freely from the side of his head.  A huge gash rends his breastplate, exposing his chest and stomach.  A thin line of red shows where the blow penetrated his armor, but it is not a killing wound.  He bleeds.  His chest heaves.  He will live.

Unfortunate.

As I draw close to the Throne, I can see that the Beast also lives, although perhaps not for long.  He hunches over on the Throne, concealing his injuries, as animals do.  But blood wells between the fingers he has clamped around his upper arm.  I can see other wounds, and the cut above his eye has started bleeding again.  But it is the blood trickling down his arm that sends fear stabbing through my belly.

I do not question the fear, or my duty, or anything else.  I run up the steps of the Throne, gathering my skirts in my hands as I go.  Not to keep from tripping, but so I can tear the hem off my robe.

I push his fingers away, noting the depth and severity of the wound.  It is deep.  Muscles and tendons severed.  Something bleeds profusely, in pulsing red washes, as soon as he releases the pressure of his hand.  A greater vessel.

I wrap the strip of robe around his upper arm as quickly and as tightly as I can.  Blood begins to soak through even as I knot the ends.  As soon as my hands are free, I press them to my Collar.

“Tomoetu, to me!”

I would not do this to any other Servant.  The Collar is linked directly to the Basilica through the minds of the Greater Quasi Dead.  The touch of their minds can kill even the strongest-willed.  But the Healers are specially trained to withstand such summonses.  I can only hope that I have not hurt Tomoetu so much that he will be unable to heal the Beast.

A flare of cold, piercing and icy, lets me know that the Quasis have relayed my call.

I press my hands against the wrappings to staunch the red tide.  “The healer is coming.”

The Beast nods.  His silver eyes flicker, rolling to white.

“Lord!”  It is not safe for him to lose consciousness here.  Others will have heard the battle, felt my use of the Quasis.  They will come.  And if they find the Beast unconscious, wounded, they may well decide to promote him to Full Dead.

I could let them.  Attired again for the bath, I have none of my weapons.  All I can do is put my body between them and the Beast.

But that is my duty to the man who sits on the Throne.

I press as hard as I can on the wound, hoping the pain will shock him awake.  He has not been Purified.  Physical pain should still affect him.

His body jerks.  He blinks and his silver eyes focus on me once more.  His hand rises as though he would touch my face.  “Angel—”  His eyes roll.

An old term, for an older concept.  But it is not part of our Faith.  I shake my head firmly.

“I am Liaden.  First Concubine to the Lord Marshal of the Necromongers.”  I grope for something he will remember.  “I serve at his will and by his command.”

“My will,” he mutters.  “My command.”

“Please, Lord, stay with me.  You must stay awake until the healer arrives.”

He grunts, sitting up a little straighter on the Throne.  He sways unsteadily, and I push my hand against his chest to keep him upright.

“Liaden!” The healer brushes me aside, and I give way to him gratefully.  “You nearly ruptured my eyeballs with that summons.”

“Master Tomoetu, I am most grateful—”

The healer holds up an age-spotted hand, silencing me.  I move away, giving him space and silence in which to concentrate.  Deep healing is complex and difficult, even for a Master as skilled as Tomoetu.  He will pull the injury into himself, letting the Little Death fill him, draw him closer to the Threshold.  Someday, some injury will carry him across.  Although I have great respect for Tomoetu and the other healers, I do not envy them.  Theirs seems a very slow way to Die.

Blood pours down Tomoetu’s arm in a carmine wash, soaking his sleeve, when he takes the Beast’s wound.  His lined face shows no pain, however.  He lifts his head toward the dim and distant ceiling.  Transcendent bliss recarves his features, shapes his mouth into a beatific smile.

The Beast growls and shifts under Tomoetu’s hands.  One of his huge paws descends on my wrist, grinding the small bones together, dragging me down beside him.  He must be drowning in pain to reveal so much.  I cover his hand with my own, trying to reassure him.

“It only takes a moment,” I say.  “Then the pain will cease.”

I don’t know that for a fact.  The Purified feel no pain on healing.

Thankfully, I’m right.  Master Tomoetu bows in an attitude of meditation.  With the healer’s hands no longer on him, the Beast relaxes.  His grip on my wrist relents, although he still holds onto me.  I settle into my customary place and prop my captured wrist on the Throne’s armrest.

An acolyte in the red robes of a healer finally catches up with his Master.  He drapes a deeply cowled robe around Tomoetu.

“A killing wound,” the acolyte whispers in awe.  “To require such a trance.  The Master ventures to the edge of the Threshold.”

I would be sorry to lose Tomoetu now.  He has always been kind to me.  When my Lord Marshal first put the Collar on me, Tomoetu helped me endure it, taking my pain when it would have driven me mad, driven me away from the Faith.

But I cannot let sorrow, or anything else, interfere with my duty.

“Healer,” I say.  “The Lord Marshal has other wounds.”

The acolyte nods apologetically and approaches the Throne, hands outspread.

The Beast shrinks away.  “I’m okay.”

Intractable Beast.

“At least let me look at them,” I plead.

When the Beast nods, I tear off more of my already ruined robes to wipe away the blood so that I can get a good look at the wounds.  His ear is torn, a deep gash that nearly severs the lobe.  The cut above his eye has reopened, but subsides when I put pressure on it.  A shallow cut scores his right shoulder.  It has already begun to clot.  Only the ear needs healing.

The Beast submits sullenly, resentfully, to the second healing.  His hand clamps down on my wrist again when the acolyte takes his wound.  I stroke his gloved knuckles, the only thing I can think of doing, until the pain passes.

The acolyte, the blood on his ear already drying, bows low.

“See to Vaako,” the Beast says.

“But my Lord Marshal—” the acolyte begins.

“I left him alive on purpose.  Make sure he stays that way.”

The acolyte bows again, and moves off towards the man lying on the floor.  Vaako’s position is so similar to that of the body that lay there a few short hours before, it sends a pang through my chest.

The Beast looks over at me.  Faint amusement illuminates those quicksilver eyes.  “Thought you said he’d hesitate.”

“Forgive me if I misjudged him, Lord—”

He shakes his head.  “You were right.  He only struck that last blow.”  He nods at his arm.  “When he thought I was gonna kill him.”

“And yet you did not.”

He could have.  He could have rid himself of Vaako and claimed his Dame in one fell stroke.  I have heard about his interaction with Dame Vaako when he was first brought on board.  He called her beautiful.  I saw her lead him before the Quasi Deads without a fight.  But then, she has that animal allure that would appeal to a Beast.  Why not, then, seize the opportunity to rid himself of a rival and claim what he covets?

“Wasn’t the point,” he says.

I sense that there was more than one point to the Beast’s actions.  He is more subtle than I initially guessed.  A sly, slippery Beast.

He sits back heavily.  I feel a fine tremor run through the hand still locked around my wrist.

He must be exhausted.  He is, after all, still mortal.

“Lord, you are twice-wounded today.  And healing takes a toll on the strongest man.  You have met with your commanders and defeated Vaako.  Surely you can rest now?”

The Beast smiles.  “You lookin’ out for me, Liaden?”

“That is my duty, Lord.”

“Mmm.”  He remains motionless on the Throne for a minute, surveying the scene.  What does he see with those silver eyes?  Me kneeling at his right hand.  Vaako prone on the floor below.  The two healers in their trances.  The witchy Elemental lurking in the shadows of the balcony.  Has she been there all this time?  Watching, calculating, doing nothing.  Will she serve the Beast?  What other purpose does she have for remaining here?  Or is it that she cannot leave?

“Lord.”  I nod at the Elemental.

The Beast’s eyes follow my movement.  He watches the Elemental for a moment, and she him.  Finally, she glides forward.

“Why’re you still here?” the Beast asks.  His voice is low, as ever, but there is a strange tone to it.  He is bemused, perhaps.  Surely it could not be that he is . . . deferential?

“I’m curious to see the outcome of events,” the Elemental says.  Her robes flicker in a breeze only she feels.  The sight sends a chill up my spine.  Unnatural creatures, Elementals.  Aspiring to be gods.

“Thought you’d have it figured out by now.”

The Elemental’s blue eyes shift to me.  “There are variables here that I am still trying to grasp.  Variables which may have a significant impact on the outcome.”

“Yeah, and?”

The Elemental crosses her hands over her stomach and looks at the Beast placidly, like a herd beast awaiting slaughter.  “I would like to stay to watch how these variables unfold.  If I may.”

The Beast watches her steadily for a moment, calculating in his own manner, perhaps.  Finally, he nods.  “Find her somewhere to stay,” he says to me.  He glances back at the Elemental, mocking amusement twisting his mouth.  “Somewhere other than the dungeon.”

The Basilica has no dungeon, although some of the ship’s lower reaches are as forbidding.  And that is where she should be kept, this faithless unbeliever, instead of being allowed to roam the upper halls at will.

But a faithless unbeliever sits on the Throne of the Necromongers, so how can I expect anything else?  Truly, these are strange and terrifying times.

“Okay, Liaden.”  The Beast rises.  He keeps his hold on my wrist, so I am forced to follow a step behind him as he paces down the stairs.

When we pass the Elemental, her fingers brush across my bare shoulder, a ghost’s touch.  “I would speak with you,” she says to me.

I shrink away from her.  I want nothing to do with this mathematical wraith.

The Beast pauses and looks at me over his shoulder.  “You comin’?”

“Yes, Lord,” I say with undisguised eagerness.

The Beast grins at the Elemental, a sneer of white teeth.  “’Fraid the girl talk’ll have to wait.  Duty calls.”

The Elemental steps back in a flutter of her veils.  She smiles at the Beast, a cryptic smile that is at the same time coldly knowing.  And wholly unnerving.  I shrink closer to the Beast’s side.

“Another time, then,” the Elemental says, as if she has calculated this already, with certainty.

The Beast releases my wrist, but only to slide his hand warmly around my back and move me firmly beside him when he begins to walk away.

 

Outside the Great Hall, he gives me more distance, transferring his hold back to my wrist.  The motion makes me realize that he drew me close to shield me from the Elemental.  I should feel grateful to him.  But I am more grateful that he is no longer holding me so close, that I can no longer feel the unfamiliar and unwelcome heat of his body against mine.

Gratefully, I lead him to one of the stairs up into the Lord Marshal’s private chambers.  I gather my skirts to take the winding stairs.  My Lord Marshal never used these stairs.  It would have been beneath his dignity.  But I try to leave the lifts free for those moving cargo and equipment.  Those who would have to wait idly while the Lord Marshal’s First Concubine takes the lifts this short distance, since it would not be proper for me to share a lift with a common Servant of the Faith.

The stairs will do for a Beast.

His breathing sounds labored by the time we reach the top of the short flight of stairs and I feel a twinge of remorse for not taking the lift.  He is wounded and exhausted.  His comfort is my duty, even if only for two more days.  It is that small sense of remorse, surely, that has me taking his arm to guide him into the Lord Marshal’s private chamber.

“Lights,” he grumbles, and I reach hastily for my Collar to dim the lights, chiding myself for not anticipating his needs.

“Your eyes are sensitive to light, Lord?”

“Yeah.  Most of this ship’s all right, though.”

I nod.  It is a reflection of the Faith, of the dark beauty that awaits us all beyond the Threshold, the perpetual twilight of the Basilica.  It took my eyes weeks to adjust when I was first Purified.

“I will give instruction that the lights be kept low, Lord.”

The Beast nods in approval.

Tiguan, Guardian of the Chamber, stands before the graven Inner Doors, one hand on the great double-bladed axe that is the symbol of his Station.  The other hand rests easily on the pulse rifle at his hip.  When we approach, he goes down on one knee.  “My Lord Marshal,” he says.

I control a grimace.  It is no surprise to see Tiguan kneel to the Beast.  In the defense of his Lord and his Faith, Tiguan is a ruthless, brutal giant.  But in all other ways, he is as gentle as a child.  The Beast sits on the Throne of the Necromongers, so the Beast must be the new Lord Marshal.

I envy Tiguan the simplicity of his world.

Tiguan straightens and opens the Inner Doors for us.  There is another way into the Lord Marshal’s private chamber.  A more secret and harrowing way, through the resting place of Bayle, one of the Greater Quasi Dead.  But the Beast is tired, so I will save that route for another time.

The Beast surveys the Chamber much as he did the Great Hall, his head rotating on his thickly-muscled neck.

“Definitely woulda gone a different way,” he says.

What does he mean?  The Lord Marshal’s Chamber is a glorious homage to the Faith.  Each dark, arched wall panel in the hexagonal Chamber is topped by a sepulchral head, the Conquest Icon.  These somber visages peer down on the Lord Marshal’s private desk and the great Sarcophagus, a temporary resting place until the final glory of the UnderVerse is attained.  The room is topped by the Meditation Ceiling, holopainted by Valjean himself, in the time of Kryll.  A gleaming vision of the Threshold.  There is none finer in the entire Armada.

There are no other furnishings and no need for any.  Doors set invisibly into the wall panels lead to the Lord Marshal’s Wardrobe, the Chamber of the Bath, and the Lord Marshal’s private chapel.  An open archway behind the Sarcophagus leads to my small chamber, the only room in the Basilica without a door.

A Concubine is ever ready to serve her Lord.  She requires no privacy because she keeps no secrets from her Lord.

“Would you like a bath before you rest, Lord?”

“No.”

I wince at the thought of his sweaty, blood-stained body soiling the Sarcophagus’s silken sheets.  But I say nothing as I help him remove his boots and his armor.  His eyes follow me when I move towards the door to the wardrobe, and are still on me when I return with a sleeping robe.

“I don’t need that,” he growls.  “Where’s the bed?”

I gesture to the Sarcophagus.

“That fucking thing’s a bed?”

Shocked that he would speak so disrespectfully of the Sarcophagus, I move towards it, as though I might shield the sacred coffin from his blasphemy with my body.  He follows me, but I can see from the set of his head, the way he clenches his fists at his sides, that he is greatly displeased.  Why?

Stepping up onto the base of the Sarcophagus’s platform, I fold back the black blankets, stiff and gleaming with holobroidery.  When he does not approach any further, I run my hand across the silken sheets.

“It is very comfortable, Lord.”

The Beast growls in disbelief, but finally moves past me, climbing over the stone lip.  It should hurt me to see him defile the Sarcophagus.  To slide his unpurified flesh between the Lord Marshal’s black silk sheets.  But I am too numb, my mind too befuddled by everything that has transpired.  Uncertain, I linger beside the Sarcophagus.  What now?

My Lord Marshal wanted no assistance when he retired, which was rare in any event.  The Half Dead need little sleep.  I don’t know what to do now.  The holy dead still await me, but my duty to the man who sits on the Throne feels unfinished.  What does he want?  What does he require?  He gives me no sign.

Finally, I reach across and tuck the sheets in around him.

“Turn the lights off,” he grumbles, and I comply.

“Before tonight,” he says, his voice thinning with exhaustion.  “I want this fucking thing out of here and a real bed brought in.  I’m not sleepin’ in this again.”

I swallow a cry.  He dares insult the Sarcophagus?  Five Lords Marshal have slept in its granite embrace.  It is a resting place truly worthy of a Lord Marshal.  And how are we to remove it?  It weighs more than the Throne.

“You hear me, Liaden?”

I force the words to come out evenly, instead of in a hiss.  “Yes, Lord.”

I step carefully down from the Sarcophagus.  Every millimeter of this room is as familiar to me as my own skin.  I need no light to traverse it.  But the granite dais is highly polished and can be slippery, so I move with care until I reach the floor.

“Where you goin’?” he asks, his voice leaching into a register so low I can barely hear him.

“I was bathing the Dead, Lord, when you called for me.  I will have them prepared by the time you wake, so that you may hold your Vigil before the feast tonight.”

The Beast grunts, a sound I take for assent as I slip towards the door to the Chamber of the Bath.

“Come back here when you’re finished.”  His rumble is cavernous from within the Sarcophagus.  “I’ll sleep better knowin’ that blow-gun’s between me and the door.”

I cannot control a hiss at that.  He would deny me my Vigil?

“Go on, Liaden.  You’re keepin’ me awake.”

“Yes, Lord.”  I bow out, barely remembering the proprieties in my fury.

He hardly grants me enough time to observe the most basic rites before dragging me back to minister to his fleshly wounds, and then he _dares_ keep me from honoring my Lord in vigil and in prayer?  I will not.  I will not kneel.  I will not obey these unreasonable demands.  My true duty is to _my_ Lord Marshal, to see his holy Remains properly interred with all due ceremony and . . .

A flare from my Collar, white hot and scorching against the bone of my neck and spine, staggers me.  It burns through me, like the touch of a brand.  I can smell my flesh smoking, as it did when my Lord Marshal first placed the Collar on me.

I flail in shock, my hands scrabbling over the door that has closed behind me.  My Lord Marshal punishes me.  I have failed him.  I have delayed too long in doing my duty and he punishes me.  But how?  Does he reach back in Death to lay his whip on me?

I fall to my knees, my hands on the Collar, trying to soothe it, placate it, rocking back and forth until the agony subsides.  The purification marks on my neck took away my pain.  Except this.  Except the terrible pain of Punishment.

I stand slowly, calming my breathing, wiping tears from my cheeks.  It has been years since I was punished so sharply.  Since I was so delinquent in my duty that I felt the Collar’s true wrath.  Not since . . . no, better not to think of that.  It is only the Beast’s disruption that stirs what must be forgotten.  I am true to my Station.  I have my duty, and it does not lie in this small corridor.

I walk shakily into the Chamber of the Bath.

Three Servants look up when I enter.  I hiss at them.  They should not be here.  My Lord Marshal’s body is not dressed.  The girl’s body still lies in the cold tub, her blood staining the water.

“Get out!” I hiss.

Two of the Servants flee immediately.  The other, caught in the act of laying fresh towels, backpedals in fright, trips over his heels and sits down heavily.  His coccyx connects with the marble floor with a crack so sharp it makes me wince even through my fury.

“My, my, my Lady—”

“What do you do here, Gerjun?!  You have no—”

The Servant holds out a towel defensively.  “I always change the towels after the Lord Marshal’s bath, Lady.  You, you directed me to do so yourself.”

_Every day.  At sixteen-thirty.  The Lord Marshal.  Is to be bathed._

I squeeze my eyes closed and try to collect my whirling thoughts.

Of course the Servants change the bath linens now.  My Lord Marshal’s bath should be over and I should be attiring him for evening prayers.  Instead my Lord Marshal lies naked and bloodless on the cold marble and a Beast lies insensate in his bed, insulting the holy Sarcophagus with his unpurified flesh.

The horror of it is more than I can bear.  A scream echoes through the bath.  Another, and another.  It is only when my throat is too raw to scream again that I realize the screams are mine.

Gerjun scrambles to his feet and flees.

I sink to my knees.  Cold marble under my legs, my hands.  I scrabble across it, seeking escape.  My short fingernails snap and splinter on the marble.  Sobs ring off the walls.  My tears drip on stone.

Warm arms around me.  A hand in my hair, careful to avoid the Rift clasp.  A slender shoulder under my cheek.  Aimi’s orchidos perfume, the one we created specially for her, fills my nose.

“I’m here, Li.”

I let her rock me.  Aimi understands.  She served our Lord, too.  Even if she felt little for him, she must understand the horror we have descended into at his passing.  There is no shame in sharing my grief with her.

We Necromongers understand grief.  It is our constant companion through Life, until we finish the Campaign and reach the UnderVerse.  Where there will be no more grief, no more pain, no more tears.  Where the Threshold will scour the flesh from the Beast’s unbelieving bones and scatter his spirit into the dark between the stars.  Where I will be reunited with my Lord Marshal in unLife.  But until then . . . until then.  How can I bear this?

Aimi offers me no false platitudes.  She merely rocks me and lets me cry until I have no more tears.


	4. Chapter 4

Aimi squeezes my hand and rises.  “If you need me, Li . . .”

I smile at her.  She is a true friend, the only friend I have among the Lord Marshal’s household.

My eyes are dry.  My throat is as well, but Gerjun has brought me a glass of water to moisten it.  I smile at him, too.  I should not have raged at him.  He was only doing his duty.  He deserves better from me.

Looking at his thin, plain face, I remember when he came to us, after the conquest of Jeranda, where Toal covered himself in glory, and in doing so came to the notice of both my Lord Marshal and Aimi.  Gerjun lost a wife and child when our ships descended.  Even after he was Purified, he cried himself to sleep every night.  Education should have taken away his pain, but it was too great.  I had forgotten, until now, how much he suffered.

I give him a gentler smile.  He deserves a great deal better from me.

“Thank you, Gerjun.  It was kind of you to bring Aimi.”

He bows.  “You’re welcome, Lady.  I have not forgotten the ladanium you sent me every night when I first came here.”

I had forgotten.  Thoughtless.  Tiguan brought the little man’s pain to my attention and I gave the order that Gerjun be given a drink of ladanium with his dinner every night for a month.  A month of dreamless sleep.  A month to grieve and to forget.  The same month that Fainche gave me when first I came to my Lord Marshal’s service, still grieving for the loss of my world and my life and my betrothed . . .

No, I will not think on that.  I smile again at Gerjun.  “Gerjun, would you do me a service?”

“Of course, Lady.”

“I need to speak with the Master Builder privately.  Could you find him for me?”

The small man glows with the honor of serving me.  I should have noticed his eagerness before and given him greater opportunities than changing towels.  Not all Necromongers excel at war, but there is a place in the Armada for everyone.  My Lord Marshal said so and it is so.  I should have developed Gerjun’s talents before.

Now there is no time.  Two days.  Who will supervise the chamber Servants when I am gone?  Who will see Gerjun’s eagerness to please and reward it?

That is not my concern.  My duty lies with the Remains on the floor.

“Li, will you be all right now?” Aimi asks, distracting me.

I smile and nod, grateful for her comfort, for her willingness to share my grief.  I expect Aimi to excuse herself, since I know she has no affinity for the Dead, but she lingers even after Gerjun bows out.  She looks uncomfortable, her blue eyes roving over the three tubs, skipping nervously over the one that is bloodily occupied.  She fingers an ornate necklace, gold filigree and jet beads, that graces her neck.  It is not something I have seen her wear before.

“It’s just that . . .”  She pauses and I look at her quizzically.

“What?”

“Just that . . . Lord Zhylaw . . .”

I bow my head to honor the Dead.  “It is hard to see him like this, I know.”

“No . . . I mean, I know you had great respect for Lord Zhylaw.”

“Of course I did.  We all did.”

Aimi’s face twists into an expression I cannot comprehend.  “As you say.  But he . . . he never . . .”

“What?”

“He never _claimed_ you, Li.  And this new Lord Marshal . . .”

I recoil.  The manner in which a Lord Marshal requires his Concubine to serve him is not something that may be questioned.  Not something that should even be spoken of.  No matter how fondly I feel towards Aimi.

“Aimi, this is not—”

“No, listen to me.  I’m afraid for you, Li.”

I shake my head at her.  The changes have unsettled us all.  Planted foolish thoughts in all of our heads.  “I know my duty.  I serve—”  The Beast.  “—the new Lord Marshal for the three days of Mourning.  And then I will follow Lord Zhylaw to the Threshold.  There is nothing to fear.”

Aimi’s eyes widen until I expect them to pop out of her skull.

“And you – you think that the new Lord Marshal will allow—?”

I turn the crystal beaker of water around in my hands to avoid looking at her.  Her concern is sweet, but misplaced.  “He cares only for his comfort.  It will not matter to him if it is I or another who serves him.”

“But I’ve seen the way he looks at you and—”

“Aimi, please.  I have my duty.  Duty overcomes all doubt.”

Aimi folds her pale lips together and stares at me.  Finally, she turns on her heel.  “No one ever could tell you anything.”

I frown at her back.  What does that mean?  And why is she angry?  Because I refused to entertain her foolish fears?

I open my mouth to call her back.  I don’t want to part in anger.  Not when she has been so kind – my only true friend among the Lord Marshal’s household – and when we will have little opportunity to speak again before I claim my Due Time.  I want to at least wish her well and encourage her towards Toal.  But the door snicks closed behind her before I get the words out, and I am left sitting on the raised platform of the central bath.

Left alone with the Dead.

 

I have purified myself again and am back in the bath with the body of the initiate when Gerjun brings Master Builder Vinay to me.  The Master Builder flushes and lowers his eyes when he sees me sitting in the bath, my loose robes soaked and clinging to my body.  It is not proper that he should see me like this.  But neither is the request I am about to make of him, and if I do not finish preparing the Dead soon, there will be no time for a Vigil before the Beast wakes.

“Master Vinay, thank you for attending me here.  I am much occupied with the Dead, as you can see.”

“Yes, Lady Liaden.”

I smile cautiously, trying to lessen the sacrilege of what I am about to say.  “The new Lord Marshal has requested . . . he has requested that the Sarcophagus be removed from his chamber, and a new bed brought in its stead.”

Vinay gapes wordlessly.

I sponge the girl’s chill flesh as I strain to think of anything to ease the Master Builder’s shock.  “These are strange and unsettling times, Master Builder.  Let us hope that the new furnishings provide the new Lord Marshal with clarity of vision as he leads us to the Threshold.”

Vinay nods, still at a loss for words.  Finally, he manages, “It must weigh two tons, Lady.”

I had the same thought.  I fidget, wiping flesh long cleansed of any blood or impurity.  I do not want to be the one who tells the Beast the Sarcophagus cannot be removed.  Perhaps Aimi is right to be afraid for me.

“As you command, Lady.”  Vinay runs his fingers nervously down his long nose.  “I’ll get it done.  Somehow.”

“Thank you, Vinay.”  I do not envy him his evening.  But, then, I do not envy me mine, either.  “Vinay, there is one other thing.  The Elemental captured on Helion.  She will remain with the Armada for the time being.  The Lord Marshal has ordered that she be housed somewhere other than the holding cells.  I would have her close by, but not _too_ close.”

A thin-lipped smile curves under the man’s long nose.  “I understand, Lady.”  He tips his head towards the far wall, beyond which lies the Lord’s Walk and several chambers that are largely unused.  “Would you have her rooms warded?”

He understands perfectly.  “Heavily, if you would.”

The Master Builder bows awkwardly, his thick body ill-suited to a movement requiring grace.  But with those heavy muscles, he builds the most beautiful things.  His additions to the Great Hall inspire awe even in the hearts of unbelievers.  And the delicate pair of screens that he made to adorn the wall over my bed, with their carvery of flying cranes, have the power to move me to tears when I contemplate them too closely.

Gerjun starts to follow the Master Builder, but I stop him.  “Gerjun, you have done well today.  I would ask one more thing of you, and then you are relieved of your duties for the rest of the day.  Would you carry a message from me to Chef?  He doubtless prepares a great feast for tonight.  I would not want him to rush his preparations and then have to wait while the new Lord Marshal rises and dresses.  Would you tell Chef that the feast will be late?  Perhaps as late as twenty hundred.  Could you do that for me?”

Gerjun nods, the same eagerness lighting his features.  “With pleasure, Lady.”

I watch him go and my smile slips.  Who will reward him when I am gone?

I shake my head and return to the Dead.

 

I am still dressing the girl, twisting her hair into the locks of the Penitent, when the Beast prowls into the antechamber where I have laid the Dead.

I look up in surprise.  He seemed so tired that I did not expect him to rise for hours.  But it has only been a little over two since he lay down.

He glances over the bodies, his silver gaze assessing.  “So this is where you are.”

I stand and nod, folding my hands over my damp, torn skirt.  “Forgive me, Lord.  I did not know you’d awakened.”

He grunts and crosses the room to stand next to me, ignoring the holy Remains that lie on the neighboring platform.  Impious Beast.

Kneeling next to the girl, he surveys my handiwork.  I have washed and combed her hair until it lies in a sleek brown curtain around her still features.  Two long twists depend from her temples to her breast, one held in place with a heartsblood gem from my own coffers.  The other waits the matching gem I hold in my hand.  I have given her robes from my own wardrobe, a long white gown that frames her face with its high collar, holobroidery gleaming pearl and gold in the candlelight.  The gown leaves only a square of her chest and the tips of her fingers exposed.

No initiate in my memory has been so honored.  Doubtless the Beast will not notice.

The candlelight flickers, disturbed by a small movement of one of the Vigil acolytes.  The Beast glances up and scowls.

“Out.  Everyone out.”

It is the Lord Marshal’s right to honor the Dead alone.  I nod at the acolytes and they file out silently.  Even though I am not quite finished with the girl, I follow them, clutching the heartsblood gem in my hand.  I can finish later; it is the work of a few moments.  And getting out of my chill, damp robes will be a relief.

“Except.  You.”

The Beast’s growl stops me in my tracks.  There is no doubt as to whom he means.  I squeeze my eyes closed.  I should be honored.  Had my Lord Marshal done me such an honor, to sit Vigil with him, I would have been the most blessed of all Concubines.  But from the Beast it is hollow, meaningless.

I pass my hand over the lens beside the door to close it behind the acolytes, and return to his side.  Settling onto my knees beside him, I feel the ice-cold touch of the stone seep through my clammy robes.  I should be beyond such small physical pains.  But I am still unsettled and they bother me more than they should.  My knees ache.  I stifle a shiver.

_A Concubine performs her duty without complaint, without regard for personal cost._

So I ignore my physical discomforts, arranging my hands in my lap and bowing my head in reverence to the Dead.

We sit for a long time, with only the sound of breathing, his and mine, to disturb the silence.

The Beast finally speaks.  “She came after me.”

I have learned my lesson about responding to him when he is thinking aloud.  Silent, I glance at him.  He is staring down into the girl’s face.  I have studied her features while I bathed and dressed her.  She has a pretty face.  Sharp-featured, like a clever animal.  I can see how she would appeal to him.

“Always knew I’d be the death of her,” he continues.  He places his hand on top of hers, neatly crossed over her breasts in the traditional attitude of Final Repose.  A brown rime of dried blood mars his bare arm.  I grit my teeth.  I should have insisted on bathing him before he slept.

“That’s why I stayed away so long.  Thought she’d be safer without me.”

It is strange to hear him admit uncertainty.  He seems so confident.  It is an oddly intimate moment.

An intimacy I want none of.

“But she followed me anyway.  Signed with mercs.  Ended up worse off than if I’d stayed.  I shoulda stayed.”

His face betrays nothing, but his words, his deep voice, convey his sorrow and remorse.  They paw through my chest, rummaging through places still raw with my own grief.  I lay a tentative hand on the Beast’s blood-stained arm.

He rises suddenly and stands over the girl.

“I want her burned,” he says.

Sacrilege!  To incinerate the Remains.  To deny her the chance of crossing the Threshold and finding peace in the UnderVerse.

“Lord—” I begin, enraged.

“You heard me, Liaden.  No fucking Necro ceremonies.  Burn her.”

I bow my head to hide my impotent fury.  He has no right!  She has been Purified.  If her body is taken to the Threshold with the Others Who Wait, her soul will find its place in the UnderVerse.  I will not burn her.  I will not commit sacrilege.  Not by his command or any other . . .

My Collar incandesces, a lash of fire circling my neck, a blow-torch burning down my spine.  It has not done so since the very first day it was set into my flesh.  The smell of my own burning flesh makes me retch.  I clutch at it, unable to stifle a cry.

The Beast turns.  Catching my wrist, he pulls my hand away from the glowing Collar and drags me upright.

As soon as he touches me, the pain stops.  The Collar’s branding iron glow dies.

“What the fuck was that?”

I don’t know.  I cannot explain it.  He should not be able to command me.  And defiance of his command, in thought or in deed, should not provoke any reaction from the Collar.  He is not True.  He cannot be.  There must be another explanation, even though I cannot guess what it is.

I shake my head, unable to put the inexplicable into any words he will understand.

“Liaden—” he begins, an angry growl.  But then he seems to soften.  “That hurt you.”

His iron grip on my wrist is hurting, too.  I tug on my hand.  He releases me and I stumble back a step, as much from the surprise of sudden freedom as from the stiffness in my knees.

“I was disobedient in thought, Lord.  The Collar delivered me a lesson.  I am reminded of my duty.  I will . . . do as you command.”

The Beast watches me, his eyes inscrutable.  He reaches out and circles my neck with his hands, his thumbs exploring the cool metal links of the Collar.

“Thought this was just a communicator.  But it’s not, is it?”

I swallow hard.  The sensation of his hands on my bare skin is alien, hateful.  “No, Lord.”

“What is it?”

I give him the least informative answer I can think of.  “The Collar of the Whip.”

He tilts his head at me.  His thumbs move across my collar, from skin to metal, metal to skin, back and forth, slowly and strangely sensuously.  “Liaden, if I didn’t know better, I’d think you were keepin’ things from me.”

It is one thing to be defiant with my head bowed, my face averted.  It is another, I discover, to attempt defiance with his hands on my skin, his eerie silver eyes burning into mine.

“The Collar of the Whip links the Lord Marshal’s Concubine to the Basilica,” I whisper.  Perhaps if I speak quickly and completely he will release me, direct that glacial glare and that disturbing touch elsewhere.  “Through it I can control some of the Basilica’s physical systems—”

“Like the lights.”

I nod.  “And through the minds of the Quasi Dead, I can speak into the minds of some of the Lord Marshal’s servants—”

“Like the healer.”

I nod again.  “But it is also a manifestation of the Lord Marshal’s will.  And a reminder of my duty.  Any transgression of that duty is punished by the Collar.  As you saw.”

“Yeah, I saw.”  His hands move, sliding over the silk straps of my robe to my bare shoulders.  “Didn’t see ‘em on the other three, though.”

“I am the only Concubine currently honored with the Collar.”

The Beast snorts.  “You got a strange idea of honor.  How d’you get it off?”

“It does not come off, Lord.”  Not without killing me, since the Collar’s symbiotic technology has grafted itself into my nervous system.  “Only death can release a Concubine from the Collar.”

The Beast’s lip curls in disgust.  “Slave collar.”  His hands tighten on my shoulders.  “So.  What were you thinkin’, Liaden?  When it punished you?”

If only those hot, heavy hands would release my shoulders.  If only his rough thumbs would stop moving over my skin.  Then I could think clearly.  Then I could formulate answers that would satisfy him and yet tell him nothing.  But his hands remain, and his thumbs keep moving, and I cannot think.

“That it was sacrilege to burn her body, Lord.  And that I would not do it.”

At my words, the Collar flares.  A brief singe, quickly dispersed when his hands move on me again.

“You were gonna disobey me.”  It is not a question.  But there is no anger in his face or his voice or his touch.

“Yes, Lord.”  I drop my eyes.  I cannot look at him and admit my failing.

“And now?”  His voice is soft, almost coaxing.

I will not kneel.  But I will obey.  “I will do as you command, Lord.”

“Will you?”  The mockery has returned.  “We’ll see.”

He releases me and I step back.  The relief of no longer having his hands on me is profound.

“I will take her now, Lord, if it pleases you.  So that I may return and bathe you for the feast.”

One dark eyebrow lifts.  “What feast?”

That he has forgotten my mention of the feast when he forgets nothing, misses nothing, gives me the true measure of his earlier exhaustion.  “Your Coronation feast, Lord.  The commanders and courtiers gather to honor you as their new Lord Marshal.”

He laughs without humor.  “To figure out how to take me down.”

At least he grasps the truth of the situation.  “As you say, Lord.”  I spread my hands in a shrug.

“You’ll be at my side,” he says, his silver eyes sliding up and down me.  “Same as when I spoke to Toal.”

“Yes, Lord.”

He reaches out suddenly, as though he would touch my cheek.  I flinch before I can stop myself, unready to have his hands on me again so soon.

He lets his hand drop.

“Go on, Liaden,” he says roughly.

I nod.  A quick pass of my hand over the lens on the side of the girl’s platform and it rises to hover next to me.

The Beast turns and strides to the door back into the Lord Marshal’s chamber.  “Hurry up.  I want that bath.”

The way he says it, the emphasis that he puts on such an innocuous word as _bath_ , turns it into something obscene.  I shudder and move hastily towards the far door.


	5. Chapter 5

No one questions me when I walk the girl’s Remains through the heart of the Basilica.  Although I am still clothed only in my damp, torn robes, no one stops me.  I pass many in the corridors on my way to the Basilica’s fiery gorge, the only place I can think of to burn the girl’s body.  Those who recognize me, or recognize the insignia of my status, acknowledge me with bowed heads or a few soft words.  None question me.  None stop me.

No one will know of the sacrilege I commit.  But it will lie heavy on my heart until my Due Time, and perhaps beyond.

Why, then?  Why can’t I flout the Beast’s order?  Even the shadow of that thought has the Collar glowing, illuminating the dark corridors with its light.  Incomprehensible.  Perhaps it is not a punishment from the Beast, but rather from my Lord Marshal, for the services I have already rendered to the Beast.  For not objecting, aloud and violently, to the sacrilege the Beast has ordered me to commit.

But not even in the dimmest traditions have I heard of a Lord Marshal punishing his Concubine beyond death.  Two of Baylock’s Concubines shirked their duty and refused to follow their Lord to the Threshold, and nothing like this happened to them.  Why then?  Why this incomprehensible punishment?

“Where are you going with such a curious cargo, Liaden?”  The question shocks me out of my thoughts.  I look up and meet the malevolent eyes of Vaako’s Snake.  Of course, it would be her.  “And so curiously dressed?” she coos.

“Neither is any of your affair,” I answer coolly.

“Your robe is wet,” she observes.  “Have you been bathing our new Lord Marshal?  Tell me, Liaden.  Is he as magnificent as he appears?”  Her eyes glitter carnally.

Not dignifying her lewd speculations with a response, I wave the hovering platform after me and continue down the corridor.

The Snake, however, seems determined not to let me go.  She paces alongside me, with that swaying gait of hers that inspires such intense interest among the men of the court, flashing her gilded thighs through the slit in her fluttering skirts.  Her hand remains firmly on the far edge of the platform.

“Your dress is torn.  You never appear in anything torn.  In anything even wrinkled.  But now you walk the halls of the Basilica in a wet, ruined dress?  Curious.  Very curious.”  Her voice lilts upward suggestively.

Pointedly, I ignore her.

She reaches across the platform and swipes her hand over the lens so the platform halts.  Leaning across the girl’s body, she hisses, “Did _he_ tear your robe?  Was he rough with you, Liaden?  Did he force you?  Overpower you?”  Her tongue flickers out and wets her lips.  “He’s so very large.  So virile.  Foolish of you to try to resist him.”

She truly is a viper.

I gaze at her disdainfully, a gesture honed to razor-sharpness by long practice in front of my mirror.  “Your lord must be very forgiving, to allow you to entertain such thoughts about other men.  I had not heard that of him.  But then, you have been apart much of late.”  I touch a finger to my lips as I look at her, another practiced gesture, designed to convey contempt.  “Such a shame about his failure.  On his Day of Days, too.  He is lucky to have survived.”

Her eyes flare.

I continue before she can interrupt.  “Or has he?  Are you a widow now, Saiuda, free to think about any man as you choose?”  Black emotion flickers through those seductive eyes.  How she hates it when anyone uses her name instead of her title.  “I did not see you at Vaako’s side.  I didn’t see you tearing that lovely gown to bind his wounds.”

“What?”

Excellent.  Better than I could have hoped.  “You didn’t know?  Does Vaako share so little with you now that he seeks succor for his injuries elsewhere?”

“Vaako – injured?”  She draws back.

I have rattled her.  “Perhaps you should tend to your wounded, Saiuda.  And leave the Lord Marshal’s Concubine to her own affairs.”

Her eyes flash, but she turns on her heel and rushes away as quickly as her tight gown will allow.  I permit myself a smile.  I rarely engage in such battles.  It is beneath my station.  But when I do, I always win.

There are no other questions, no further distractions, as I make my way down into the lower levels of the Basilica.  Here are the great generators that power the mighty ship, their metal flanks sheathed in black flame and swirling ash.  Beyond them, the incinerators that render to dust the refuse of the Legion Vast.

A few technicians watch me with vague curiosity as I guide the platform to the incinerators.  But they do not question, do not stop me.  They are Servants of the Lord Marshal themselves, and they know my rank and insignia, if not my face or name.

I stand before the incinerators, feeling their withering heat slap across my skin.  I place my hand over the dead girl’s crossed hands and bow my head.

I say none of the homilies for the Dead.  It would be further blasphemy in the face of what I am about to do.  I say merely, “May your soul find peace.”

Then I wave my hand across the lens and send the platform into the flames.

 

When I return to the Lord Marshal’s chambers, I find the Beast already in the bath.  He has selected the middle bath.  Neither the scalding heat of the high bath, nor the invigorating chill of the low.  I make mental note that he prefers a mellow warmth and pick up an armful of bathing implements as I approach.

“I would have helped you, Lord,” I say.  My voice echoes oddly in the marble cavern of the bath.  A reflection of the emptiness in my chest.  I feel hollowed like a shell from the emotions of the past few hours.

The Beast rolls his head on the thick cushion of the bath’s rim.  His silver eyes search my face, but it is not his eerie eyes that capture my attention.

Bruises blossom purple and red across his golden skin.  Across the broad slab of his chest, where the armor did not fully protect him from the force of my Lord Marshal’s blows.  Down his sides, along his ribs, where he had no protection at all.  A massive, livid mark the shape of a boot-heel discolors his hip.  There is barely any space on his torso that is not decorated by injury.

“Lord—”  I fall to my knees beside the tub, my hand reaching involuntarily towards him.

“Looks worse than it feels,” he grunts.

With my hands on his skin, sultry from the warm water, I urge him forward so that I can look at his back.  The sight draws a hiss of sympathy from me.  There are fewer contusions there, but one, along his spine, is shiny-red with swelling.

“Lord, this may still be bleeding inside.  I think we should have a healer see to you again.”

He hunches his shoulders and pushes back against my hands until I let him lie back in the tub.  “No more healers.”

“Lord—” I protest.

“For someone who’s supposed to follow my commands, Liaden, you spend a lotta time arguing with me.”

That stings.  Particularly after what I have just done at his command.  “I’m only trying to do my duty, Lord.  A duty that includes taking care of the Lord Marshal’s physical well-being, if you would just let me—”

“You and I got different ideas ‘bout your duties.”

He dares question the scope of my duty?  After he just commanded me to commit sacrilege?  I open my mouth to retort furiously, but he holds up a hand.

“Before you get yourself in a snit.”  My wordless exclamation curves that mobile mouth into a smile.  “You can fix me up.  If, an’ only if, you tell me where you’re from and how you got here.”

He wants to know about me?  How . . . odd.  No one has asked me about my past since I Converted.

“But no healers.  An’ not one fuckin’ word about crawling in slime.”

“Yes, Lord.”

Absently, filled with thoughts I have not entertained in years, I rise and move to a set of concealed doors in the far wall.  Sliding them open, I withdraw the pots of salve and instruments I will need to treat his injuries.  They are better for sore muscles, strained by training or battle.  But they will ease his bruises, too.

My gaze falls across a stack of handmade soaps.  An experiment in some of the stronger-scented products of my Garden; the same experiment that produced Aimi’s orchidos perfume, and the one I wear on special occasions.

Zhylaw did not favor the soaps.  He claimed the smell was unappealing.  It is strong, true, but warm and musky.  Perhaps . . .

I add one to the pile I carry.

I return to the Beast’s side and offer him the soap while I arrange the salves at the edge of the tub.  “Would this suit you?”

He sniffs at the soap and shrugs.  Then he glances at my face, takes a more deliberate sniff and nods.  “Yeah, nice.  Stop evading the question, Liaden.”

For once, I was not.  At least, not intentionally.  I spread salve on the inside of an infra-red cloth and wrap it around his chest and back, under his armpits, covering the worst of his bruises.  The salve and infrared heat will soothe the pain and stimulate the deep tissues to heal themselves.  Then I lather a sponge with the soap and begin at his fingertips.

“I was born on Marcin’s Planet, but my family moved cross-quadrant to Tarenge when I was still a child.”

“Tarenge?” His deep voice asks more than the name.  Wondering, no doubt, why my parents would chose such a backwards, forbidding planet.

“My parents were Daixians.  Their faith was welcome on Tarenge.  Or, at least, not persecuted.”

“So which kid are you?  Obviously not the first.”

He’s referring to the Daixian practice of sacrificing the first-born to Xia, the bloody warrior-god.  It surprises me that he is so familiar with my birth-religion.  A knowledgeable Beast.

“No.”  I sponge the ichorous residue of healing off his right arm.  “I am the third.”

“The wailer.”

“Child of sorrow.”  I nod.

“That what you were doin’ when the Necros came?  Singin’ dirges to Xia?”

“No.  My parents died when I was twelve.  On a hunt.”  The Beast’s narrow-eyed nod shows that he knows what Daixians would have been hunting.  “My older brother tried to hold onto their claim for us, but he could not pay the land-pledge.  So I gave bond to a Feleti family in the capital.”

“Your brother sold you.”

I shrug.  “Seven years of servitude was not too high a price to pay for my brother and my sisters to stay on our land.”

The Beast shakes his head and leans it back against the bath’s cushioned rim.  His eyes drift closed, the silver shine slowly shuttering.  “Then what?”

“When my bond was finished I would have returned home.”  To Danton, Idana, and little Tatlynn . . . but also to Hanuel, my betrothed.  Hanuel’s face flashes back to me, his warrior scars prominent on his cheeks, the nine braids of his kills shading his dark eyes.  Four years dead now.  “The Necromongers came first.”

“How old were you?”

“Nineteen standard.  I had only three months left on my bond.”  I lean over him to sponge dried blood off his neck.  He grunts when I pass the sponge over the faint wheal that is all that is left of the crushing injury to his throat.  “Does this still hurt?”

“No.”  He lies automatically, and so naturally that I would not know if his body had not just betrayed him.  “The Necros capture you?”

I grimace at the memory.  “No, Lord.”

The silver eyes open.  “What then?”

“The Feletis I served turned themselves and their household over to the Necromongers after the first wave of the invasion,” I say, my voice thinned with disgust that has not faded with time.

The Beast grunts in a way that might indicate amusement.  “Including you.”

“Yes, Lord.”  Kicking and screaming and trying to kill anything in my path, particularly my traitorous master.  But I had lived too long among the soft Feletis.  I had forgotten the warrior-way and neglected my training.  I was easily subdued.

And then the Purifier spoke to me.  He helped me understand that the invaders were warriors, too.  Great warriors, greater than the Daixians.  The greatest army that has ever moved across the stars.  In the name of the greatest cause the galaxy has ever seen.

It was a relief, and a privilege, to Convert.

Until Zhylaw chose me to succeed his First Concubine, Fainche, whose execution for her participation in a plot to have Commander Husulu named as my Lord Marshal’s successor had already been decreed and awaited only the selection and training of a replacement.  Until I understood that it would be my fate not to die gloriously in the name of the Faith, slaying and converting the Faithless, but to serve again, as I had served for seven long years.

Then I fought again, bucking my fate, until the Collar subdued me.  It taught me my duty, burned it into my flesh and bone, engraved it onto my soul, so that I cannot fight it even when it forces me to serve a Beast.

“An’ you ended up here,” that self-same Beast says softly, his eyes drifting closed again.  Noticing that I have sponged the same spot on his neck until it is red with cleanliness, I shift around the tub so that I can wash his other side.  “How’d you come to be First Concubine?”

“My Lord Marshal chose me,” I say simply.

And it was that simple.  Not long after my purification, I was taken before Zhylaw with a great many other recent Converts.  My Lord Marshal looked at each of us, and when his gaze fell on me, I felt him tearing through the illusory layers of appearance to peer into my soul.  He said nothing.  Only later, when Fainche came to my small cell and told me to bring anything I valued, did I learn that I had been Chosen.

“How?”

I pull myself out my memories to consider the Beast’s question.  He no doubt inquires so that he can go about choosing others.  He has admitted the idea of having many women devoted to him appeals to his bestial nature.  The thought is disquieting for no reason I can name.  But I push the disquiet away.  He will need to choose at least one new concubine in only two more days.

“My Lord Marshal ordered all new Converts brought before him.  He inspected each of us and made his choice.”

The Beast does not ask why my Lord Marshal chose me, for which I feel faint gratitude.  Many courtiers have asked.  Both sneeringly, to my face, and in whispers, behind my back.

I let neither the sneers nor the whispers touch me.  I have done my duty without flinching, without failure, since I bowed to the Collar.  If that fortitude is what my Lord Marshal saw when he looked into my soul, it is something to be proud of.

That I always yearned for him to have seen more, to have valued me for more than my devoted service, is of no moment.

“Why First?” the Beast rumbles.  “Why not promote one of the others?”

“I could not tell you, Lord.  My Lord Marshal did not share his reasons with me.  He only said he felt better with me at his side than Gennica or Iloru or Aimi.  In truth, they are not strong fighters.”

The Beast grunts.  “Doubt that’s the only reason he chose you.”

He shifts suddenly and I realize that I have passed my sponge directly over the shallow wound on his shoulder.  Careless.  I’ve let his questions and my memories distract me from my duty.  That is why Fainche bid me banish all thoughts of my former life and gave me the ladanium.  So that I would forget.

I focus afresh on my duty.  “Lord, if you will lift your leg?”

The Beast raises his leg out of the water, propping his heel on the bath’s rim.  Other than the violet bruise on his hip, his legs have escaped the punishment rained down on his torso.  But they bear other injuries.  His feet are covered with blisters and white, puckered sores.  He has lost several toenails and the nail beds are black with corruption.  Old scars, ropy and badly healed, circle his ankles.  It must be agony for him to stand, much less walk or run.

“Lord—”

“Yeah?”  He glances down at his foot, shrugs and lays his head back on the bath’s padding.  “Too much time in chains.  An’ someone else’s boots.”

I clean his feet slowly and thoroughly, returning to the cupboard for lances and files, and finally a silken butter that Aimi and I created from the nuts of a gadil tree we salvaged from the conquest of Jeranda.  The Beast rumbles, deep and appreciative, when I massage the lotion into the sores and then up into the old scars, softening the twisted tissue as much as I am able.

“You should keep these out of the water now,” I say when I am finished with his other foot.  The Beast obligingly shifts in the oval bath so that his feet are propped up out of the water.  I can see that this position is not as comfortable as lying in the narrow end with his back and shoulders supported, and after a few minutes, he says, “You about done?”

I am occupied with sponging off his thighs, thick with muscle and as golden as the rest of him.  “Mmm?”

“Liaden.”  He lifts his head to look at me.  His nostrils flare as though he’s scenting – truly a Beast – and a fleeting grin curves his mouth.  “You done?”

“No, Lord.  I have yet to attend to your . . .” My mouth suddenly goes dry and the words catch in my throat.  Why?  I have washed my Lord Marshal’s genitals hundreds of times.  It is no more intimate than washing his hands or face.  And there is nothing special or unusual about the Beast’s, lying quiescent in a nest of black hair.  His penis is a different color than my Lord Marshal’s, a dark purple that draws the eye.  But nothing I have not seen before, touched before.  Why, then, this strange shortness of breath?  “Organ,” I finish, feeling unaccustomed heat in my cheeks.

“My—?”  The Beast breaks off with a chuckle.  He spreads his legs, sliding his calves along the rim of the bath.  “Be my guest.”

I cannot.  Not with his eyes on me, those ghost-fire eyes that sear me when they should not.  “Please, Lord.”

“Shy, Liaden?  Thought you were a pro.”

Is that what he thinks of me?  That I am a whore?  Some common woman of the court who flocks to whatever commander or officer has current favor?  Fury and indignation stiffen my spine, drown my embarrassment, and allow me to clean him with a few clinically efficient swipes of the sponge.

My touch leaves him unmoved, as it did my Lord Marshal.  Zhylaw was beyond the needs of the flesh.  Perhaps the Beast is, too, in some strange way.  Or perhaps I fall short.  Perhaps he feels only the impersonal hands of a Servant when I touch him.  Perhaps he waits for the touch of someone like Dame Vaako to rouse his ardor.

In my darkest moments, lying cold and alone in my narrow bed, listening to my Lord Marshal at his desk in the next chamber, I wondered if that was the case with Zhylaw, too.  If my failure to stir him was the reason that he never claimed me.  But he never claimed any of his Concubines.  And whatever my failings in face or form, surely among the other three there was sufficient beauty to entice him.  Gennica, in particular, is so beautiful that sometimes it hurts to look at her.

But he never touched her.  Never touched any of us.  And I learned to respect his evolved sensibilities.  So much so that I never even pleasured myself as I lay there in the dark, as I learned to do on Tarenge while I waited out the years between my womanhood and my handfasting to Hanuel.

I shake myself.  I cannot let these ghosts distract me from my duty.

“I’m finished, Lord.”

The Beast grunts.  As I put aside my sponge, he says, “I usually shave.”

I nod.  My Lord Marshal liked to be clean-shaven, too.  But he preferred me to use an antique straight razor, a practice that will surely horrify the Beast.  Nor have I anything else with which to shave him, since I take a suppressor for my body hair, and this bath is equipped only for the Lord Marshal and his Concubines.

“I will summon a Servant for a whisker.”

The Beast frowns, a frown that prompts me to explain, “I have only the Lord Marshal’s own razor here, and—”

“That’ll do.”

I hide my surprise while I fetch the razor and a container of emollient cream from the cupboard.  Where does he come from that he does not object to a blade on his skin?  Surely not Helion, with its indulgent comforts and crossroads technology.

I shave him with the same care I gave to his feet, never once letting myself drift into distracting memories.  When his face and scalp gleam, I offer him a small hand mirror so that he may pass judgment.

He runs his hand over his jaw.  “Good job,” he says.  I bow my head so that he does not see my smile.  There is pleasure in a job well done, even if for a Beast.  “Aren’t many I’d let near my neck with a razor.”

I look up at him sharply.  Does he question my service?  Does he think me so poor a Servant that I would cut my lord’s throat while I shaved him?

His silver eyes, steady on my face, assessing and watchful, tell me nothing.  I gather the bathing things quickly and bundle them back into the cupboard.

“Liaden,” he begins.  I glance back over my shoulder at him.  His eyes flick over my face and he sighs.  “You’re hard to compliment.”

Hunching my shoulders, I finish putting the cupboard to rights.  I need no compliments from him.  I want none.  They are meaningless.

A splash spins me around.  Impossibly, he heaves himself out of the deep bath using only the strength of his arms.  His feet remain on the rim, out of the water.  He rolls over the edge, onto his knees.  I gape at him.  How can someone so hugely muscled be so agile?

He begins to stalk toward me, naked and dripping.  Then he stops, wincing, and stares at his feet.

“Didn’t hurt until you started fucking with them,” he growls.

“I’m sorry, Lord,” I say, although I’m not.  “I’ll fetch you some slippers.”

Although I cannot perceive anything amusing about that statement, the Beast roars with laughter, great, harsh caws that echo off the marble walls.  When his laughter dies down he says, “Yeah, I’d like some _slippers_.”

The emphasis sets me wondering again.  Is he not used to having slippers?  How austere a life has he led to this point that it has been devoid of slippers?

And then a trickle of ice runs through my blood.  An Austere.  Surely he could not be.  Covu the Transcended wiped them out to the last Brother.  But the Beast possesses the focus and ferocious determination of a holy warrior, and it is not Damalis he fights for.

No.  The last Austere died two centuries ago.  And yet, it is no more far-fetched than the idea of him being a Furyan.

I reach into the hanging closet next to the cupboard and withdraw my Lord Marshal’s robe and slippers.  Glancing at the Beast, I realize that the roomy robe will accommodate even his huge shoulders, but his feet are hopelessly too large for the slippers.

“Forgive me, Lord.  Slippers will have to be made for you.”

The Beast shrugs as if he expected this.  As if all luxury is merely an illusion he expects will shortly vanish.  I drape the robe around him and guide him to the lip of the middle bath’s platform.  Seating him there, I kneel at his feet and begin binding the terrible sores.  They look better for having been cleaned.

The Beast sighs comfortably while I wrap them.

“You’ve ill-used your feet,” I observe.

“Didn’t have much choice.”

I pause in my binding to examine his left heel.  I have filed away much of the dead and corrupted skin, but there is a still a blackened rind, which, after the soaking, is beginning to peel away.  Beneath it, the skin is red-raw.  Wincing at how painful that must be for him, I bind that, too.  A memory stirs, of blowing snow and achingly cold feet.  Winter hunting.  “This is frostbite,” I say.

“Uh-huh.”

I wait for him to continue, but he does not.  Clearly, he has no wish to share with me what I have shared with him.  I bow my head and finish quickly.

The Beast settles back onto his elbows and stretches out his legs.  “Why’re you sulking, Liaden?”

I never sulk.  “I am sorry the Lord finds me such poor company.”

His eyes shutter and he watches me lazily.  “How’s that?”

Standing, I indicate his feet.  “Am I so poor a servant that you will not share the story of how you came to have frostbitten feet with me?”

“You’re not—”  He sighs heavily.  “Ain’t much to tell.  Spend long enough on a ball of ice with nothin’ but urso fur to keep you warm, and you’re likely to get frostbite.”

That tells me nothing.  Not what ball of ice he was on, or how he got there, or why he had nothing but some animal’s fur to keep him warm.  I turn away from him and walk towards the door.

“Where you goin’?” he growls.

“To fetch your dress uniform so you don’t have to walk so far on those frostbitten feet,” I toss back over my shoulder.

In a rustle of holobroidered silk, he rises after me.  “I’m okay,” he insists.

Then he takes a step, comes down too hard on his raw heel and freezes, glaring down at his traitorous feet.  “I’ll be okay.”

The grudging moderation of his tone makes me smile all the way back to the sanctum.

 

When I return, he sits on the middle bath platform, his long legs stretched in front of him, crossed at the ankles and balanced on his undamaged heel.  His legs are sculptural in their beauty, golden skin defining the heavy muscle beneath.  His damaged, bandaged feet flex as I watch, giant in size and yet elegant in proportion.  There is a symmetry to his body that draws my eye and will not let it go.

He glances up when I enter; his eyes narrow when he sees Halen following me.

“Who’s he?”

Remembering my manners, I bow to make an introduction.  “This is Halen.  He cares for the Lord Marshal’s wardrobe.  He is here to measure you.  For some better-fitting boots,” I say pointedly.

The Beast grins wryly.  “I could definitely get used to this, Liaden.”

I ignore his sarcasm and wave Halen forward.  The Wardrobe Master, twitchy and finical at the best of times, seems doubly so in the Beast’s weighty presence.  He fusses around the Beast’s feet with a hand-held calibrator, tugging on his short brown hair and loudly bemoaning the fact that my wrappings are interfering with the exactitude of his measurements.

The Beast’s expression darkens. His shoulders bunch, possibly with an effort not to batter Halen.  Although I occasionally have the same impulse, Halen cannot help being what he is.  Purification, sadly, does not purge us of unpleasant personality traits.  As Dame Vaako amply attests.

I try to distract the Beast by holding out the clothes I carry.

“Halen has found these for you.  They will not fit you as well as the clothing and armor the Weavers make for you, but they will do for the time being.”  When the Beast eyes the pile of black cloth and burnished armor without comment, I add, “They will certainly fit you better than what you were wearing.”

The Beast shrugs out of his robe and holds out his arms.  Unwisely, Halen tries to take the measurement of those mammoth biceps while the Beast has his arms outstretched.  That earns him a low growl from the Beast.

I quickly interpose myself between the two men and entangle the Beast in various stages of robe and shirt, before the Beast has a chance to deliver on the promise of that growl.  Halen scurries out while I tug a tunic over the Beast’s head.

When his head emerges from the collar of the tunic, the Beast looks around darkly.  His eyes settle on me, and a faint smile curves his mouth.  “Good diversion, Liaden.”

“I know Halen can be trying.  But he is extremely diligent.”

The Beast grunts and looks down at the clothes I have used to distract him.  He fingers the thick fabric of the tunic.  “What’s this?”

“The Weavers call it Dyneemal, Lord.  It is as light as cloth, but as strong as armor.  It will stop anything but a pulse round.”

The Beast makes a low noise, and this time it is definitely approval.  “Turn a blade?”

“They say so, Lord.  I have not put it to the test myself.”

“Maybe I should get a whole wardrobe of this.”

I smile at his appreciation of his danger.  “You may find it a little hot to wear.  Particularly as trousers.”

“Good thing you Necros keep this place as cold as a tomb.”

His words puncture our shared humor, reminding me that he is not one of us.  An unbeliever.  On the Throne of the Necromongers.

I help him draw on the trousers and thick half-stockings that I have brought to cushion those terrible sores.  Then I offer him the two things still hanging over my arm.  A baldric for across his chest, and a weapons belt.

A real grin splits the Beast’s face.  “You _do_ take care of me, Liaden.”

 

I instruct a Servant to escort the Beast to the armory once Halen finds him some boots, so that the Beast can chose weapons for the baldric and belt.  Then I see to my own toilette.

I dress simply, as befits my station.  Although my dressing table is covered with containers of jewels and ornaments left to me by Fainche, I rarely wear them.  My weapons are my ornaments: the nightshade darts in the trailing sleeves of my gray gown, the deathshead pins in my collar, the Rift in my hair.  Burning the girl and bathing the Beast have left me with no time to waste, so I braid my hair and coil it into a silver-gray net, held in place by the Rift clasp.  I quickly refresh the paler on my skin, adding a little to the square of chest exposed by the formal gown that was not exposed by the higher neckline of my day dress.  Reassuring myself with a quick check in my mirror that I am uniformly cadaverous in hue, I gather my skirts and go to join the Beast.

He stalks in a circle around the Lord Marshal’s desk, his attention and silver eyes focused on the new boots cushioning his feet, attended closely by a twittering Halen.

“They’re not too tight anywhere?  With all those wrappings, I could not—”

The Beast growls at Halen and I put my hand over my eyes.  I am too far away to protect Halen this time, and I do not want to see what the Beast will do if Halen continues jabbering at him.

“They’ll do,” the Beast says.  There is no sound of flesh hitting flesh, or of Halen hitting the floor.  I sigh with relief and let my hand drop.

Halen, however, does not take the opportunity to escape.  “The ones we’re making will be a much better fit, Lord.  Once those bandages come off, of course—”

“Halen,” I say in the calmest voice I can, in the hopes of averting bloodshed.  “The Lord Marshal will be late to his Coronation feast.”

“Of course, of course.”  Halen’s hands flutter up and down in front of the Beast like agitated birds.  I can see that it is an effort for the Beast not to grab the man’s flapping hands and decapitate them.

“Haven’t been to the armory yet,” the Beast growls when I hold my hand out to him, trying to draw him away from Halen and toward the door.  The look he shoots Halen tells me unequivocally whom he blames for that.

“They will wait for you.  And it is only a few steps out of your way,” I say soothingly.

The Beast allows himself to be soothed, and offers me his arm when I’m finally able to coax him away from whatever murderous designs he had on the Wardrobe Master.

“Diligent, huh?” the Beast asks as I nod to Tiguan and we pass through the outer chamber into the corridor.

“Extremely.”

“That how you see yourself, Liaden?  Diligent?”

“I see myself as doing my duty, Lord.  No more.  No less.”

The Beast slants those silver eyes at me, but does not comment.  Nor can I read his expression so well yet that I can tell what he’s thinking.  Whatever it is, mockery, amusement, murder, it bodes ill.

“You’re not impressed by Necropolis,” I say to distract him.

“Why’d you say that?”

“I heard what you said to Dame Vaako, when you were brought before the Quasi Dead.  That you would have gone a different way.  Do the efforts of our artisans and craftsmen and laborers displease you?”

The Beast glances through the latticed screen that separates the corridor from the vastness of the Great Hall beyond it.

“Kinda dark,” he says.  “Even for me.”

I’m under no illusion that he’s talking about the lighting.

“It is a celebration of unLife.  Of the pain we endure in this Verse that will lead us into a painless existence in the next.”

“Mmm.”  The Beast makes no other comment, but I can sense his disdain for both concept and execution.  How will he rule us, this unbeliever, if he hates everything we stand for?

I purse my lips and force away the thought.  It is not my concern.  In two more days, I will join my Lord Marshal and however the Beast rules the traitors that remain is no more than they deserve.

At the end of the corridor, instead of turning left towards the feasting hall, I lead the Beast down a short flight of stairs to the armory.

When the doors open to my palm, neither Varkony, the Master of Arms, nor any of his acolytes are anywhere to be seen.  Doubtless Varkony prepares for the feast.  And his acolytes have probably sought their beds, or some evening recreation, since it is close to curfew.  So the Beast is free to wander through the armory as he pleases.  He walks down the long racks of weapons and armor thoughtfully.  I move quietly beside him, not disturbing his contemplation except to point out the occasional eldrich weapon.  This is the Lord Marshal’s own armory, so there are more than a few.

The Beast stops when I point to a pair of slender daggers, their blades rippled like waves and chased with blue steel.  “Manoj and Marened,” I tell him.  “The Water Stealers.  It is said that a man stabbed with either of them will wither away to dust in a matter of moments.”

The Beast lifts a dark eyebrow, and takes the matched daggers down from their place on the wall.

“They have special sheaths,” I say, pointing to them.  The Beast hooks the sheaths to his belt and sinks a dagger into each one with a move that looks as familiar to him as making tea is to me.

“You favor knives?” I ask.

The Beast nods.  “Easy to come by.  Hard to break.  Don’t jam or malfunction at a critical moment.”

All true, which is why I like the simplicity of my darts and pins.  I smile and beckon him with two fingers.  “This way.”

I lead him into the Alcove of Blades, where the low light glints silver and steel off a thousand honed edges.

He grins as though I have offered him a rare treat.  Moving slowly around the alcove, he collects knives.  He has a discerning eye, and picks a selection of the best, the most balanced for throwing, the longest shanked for hand-to-hand fighting.  I help him secrete them on baldric and belt and in the tops of his boots.

When we are finished, I lead him back up the stairs to the feast hall.


	6. Chapter 6

We are late, our deadly shopping trip having taken more time than I expected, and the officers and their companions are already seated at the massive stone table in the Lord Marshal’s dining hall.  When a Servant of the Table opens the door for us, the Beast removes his baldric and hands it to the man.

“Have that taken to my room.”

The Servant bows and backs away, anxious to impress his new Lord Marshal.

“Lord?” I ask quietly, not understanding why he would willingly relinquish any weapons before walking into the snake pit in front of us.

“Overkill,” the Beast murmurs.

A cautious, calculating Beast.  I nod and lead him to the head of the table, where a chair almost as imposing as the Throne waits for him.

The Beast sinks heavily into his chair, and I take my place, kneeling on the cushioned bench at his right hand.

Dame Vaako, the largest viper in the pit, leans across the table and smiles at me.  “Still with us, I see, Liaden?”

I smile back.  If she would like another lesson, I will gladly deliver it.  “Your eyes do not deceive you, Dame Vaako.”

The Beast glances at me, a silver flash from the depths of his high-backed chair.  “You goin’ somewhere?”

Not in the sense that he means, so lying to him is painless.  “No, Lord.”

“Did your Concubine not tell you?”  Dame Vaako asks, her body twisting in anticipation of the coming strike.  “It is tradition that the First Concubine follow her Lord Marshal to the Threshold.”

I keep my eyes downcast, to keep my rage from showing.  Two more days.  Two days until my Due Time, and then her taunts will mean nothing.  It would be satisfying to take her with me.  Perhaps another misstep and the Beast will let me kill her for him.

As though the mere thought of him turns him from brooding shadow to physical being, his hand falls to my neck, hot and heavy.  His fingers slide over the links of the Collar of the Whip.

“That so?” he rumbles.

I sit, resisting the urge to squirm under his oppressive hand, and wait to see where Dame Vaako plans to take this.  Surely she is not trying to prevent my death by informing the Beast of it?  Whatever her plans, they are inconsequential.  Neither she nor anyone else at this table can prevent me from following my Lord Marshal.  I am bound by no one here.  The Beast is no true Lord Marshal to claim me as Baylock did Danior.  No one can stop me from declaring my Due Time.

“Oh, yes,” she says.

A misstep, I pray.  Even a small misstep.  She is not unskilled, not the least of the Necromongers in the arts of war.  But not even she knows about the Rift in my hair.  A fitting end for her, to be devoured by the Void.

“And Liaden is such a stickler for tradition,” she continues.

I roll my eyes.  There is no _coup de grace_.  She merely baits me.  Perhaps she schemes for my place at the Beast’s side.  In two more days, she is welcome to it.  I hope she screams when he puts the Collar of the Whip on her.

I lean forward, unwrapping a black cloth from around the Lord Marshal’s gilded utensils.  I hope my motion will unseat the Beast’s hand, but like so many of my hopes this day, it is a vain one.  I lay the cloth carefully across the Beast’s thigh.  It is an old tradition, for the Lord Marshal to be served so closely at table.  The last three Lords Marshal have not observed it.  Zhylaw preferred me to sit quietly at his side, watching and listening in his stead so that he could enjoy his food.  But the Beast has shown himself inclined to a closer service, so that he can be the one to watch and listen, and I perform my duties accordingly.

Knowing that he is listening so closely, I say, “I am true to our Faith, Dame Vaako.  I serve the Lord Marshal.  At his pleasure and by his command.  I do not question my service or my duty.”

Let her be goaded.  Let her make that final misstep.

But no, her eyes merely glitter.  It is Vaako, sitting in sullen silence next to her, who is goaded.  His next breath is a hiss.  Dull color suffuses his throat.

The Beast’s hand flexes on my neck.

Around us the table falls silent as the commanders and officers wait for the Beast to begin the feast.  I glance down the table to confirm that all are ready before I offer the Basilica Cup to the Beast.  Two seats to my right, Aimi’s shaved head, looking all the more vulnerable bowed to the large man at her side, catches my eye.  I allow myself a small smile.  So she went to Toal, as I expected she would.  May she find with him that small measure of happiness permitted to us in this Verse.

The Beast’s hand finally falls away from me when I lean forward and grasp the Basilica Cup.  It is hugely heavy, carved from a single piece of jet, larger than my head.  It took a great deal of practice to be able to lift it smoothly and offer it to my Lord Marshal with my head bowed and my arms outstretched, as is proper.

The Beast takes it with one hand, as though it weighs nothing.

“It is traditional for the Lord Marshal to begin the celebratory Feast with a toast to the Dead, and an offering,” I say to the Beast in an undertone, picking up the jet offering plate.

For the first Lords Marshal, the offering burned spontaneously.  But that has not happened since the days of Baylock.  So, as I have done many times for my Lord Zhylaw, I work a tiny lighter out of my glove and hold it ready in my palm.

“Is it?”  The Beast sounds amused.

“You see?” Dame Vaako says, all droll condescension.  “Such slavish adherence to convention.  Shouldn’t a new Regime begin with something less hidebound—”

The Beast ignores her and raises the Cup.  “To the Dead,” he says.

It is not the poetic toast my Lord Marshal would have offered.  But something in me finds it satisfying, this simple homily.

The commanders and officers lift their cups in response.  “To the Lord Marshal,” they reply.

I hold the offering plate out, not needing to look at what I’m doing from long practice.  It frees me to meet Dame Vaako’s mephitic gaze.

The Beast tips the Cup and pours a few drops of Cark onto the offering plate.

Before I can apply the lighter, the black elixir flames, burning blue for a moment and then flickering to a colorless wave before collapsing to ash.

“Deftly done, Liaden,” drawls Dame Vaako.  “I didn’t even see the lighter that time.”

Because I did not apply it.

I set the plate down hastily and sink back onto my bench.  The Dead have honored the Beast’s sacrifice as they have honored no Lord Marshal in over a hundred years.  What could this mean?

Perhaps the combustion indicates the Dead’s displeasure.  But then why did they not reject the offering?  That happened at Baylock’s coronation Feast, or so it is written in the Concubines’ histories.  The offering failed to burn and the dish wept blood.  It would not stop until it was cast out into space.  Later, Danior wept that she did not cast herself after it, after Baylock Claimed her.

But the Dead have accepted the Beast’s offering.  What does it mean?

My confusion is covered by the beginning of the Feast.  Servants step forward, moving in and around the commanders and their companions, offering delicacies from a hundred conquered worlds.  I should be directing the rarest savories to the Beast.  But my mind is whirling.  Could I have applied the lighter without realizing it?  I have done it hundreds of times in Zhylaw’s service.  Perhaps my hand moved without thinking.

But my hand never slips.

A small motion beside me brings my head up.  The Beast sets the Cup down in front of me.  He is watching me steadily, eyes hooded and fathomless.

I give myself a firm mental shake.  “What is your pleasure, Lord?”

“Tea.  And somethin’ light.”

I beckon the novice who holds the Tray of Leaves.  “Tea for the Lord Marshal.”

As the boy steps forward, I search the circulating dishes and platters for something that will rest easy on the Beast’s stomach.  My own stomach tightens at the sight and smell of the rich and wondrous foods of the Feast.  But I will allow myself nothing but water, as is proper.

Sipping from my glass to appease my stomach, I look again around the table.  Burning blue eyes meet and attempt to hold mine.  Edellis the Purifier.  He leans forward and his lips move as if to mouth something to me.  I look away.  He has always been thus, even when my Lord Marshal lived.  A zealot with none of the temperance of my Lord Marshal, or even the former Purifier Principal.  A heretic who would have had me flout my duty to my Lord Marshal.  A martyr, had I not scrupulously refused him.

My eyes scan the dishes on the far side of the table from Edellis.  The Servants of the Lord’s Table, well trained, watch for my nod.  I give it to a girl bearing a platter of gravinne leaves wrapped around lightly spiced meat and an older man who holds a bowl of saurin fruit in his one remaining arm.

Satisfied, I look back to the Beast, and find his eyes still on me.  He sets a silver dish of tea leaves, my own mixture of liquorice, rowela peel and nettle by the smell of it, in front of me.

“Tastes better when you do it,” he says.

Nodding, I take the chai service from the novice and briskly whisk the tea leaves under a tipple of boiling water.

When the leaves have steeped, the Beast takes the cup from me and sits sipping it, his eyes watchful over the rim.  Palpable relief runs through me when those ice-fire eyes move on down the table.  I am becoming more used to his strange eyes.  I no longer feel a chill run down my spine whenever they turn on me.  But at moments when he is at his most inscrutable, like this one, they still have the power to unnerve me.

I prepare his dish, arranging the gravinne leaf packets in a pleasing spiral around slices of deep red saurin fruit.  A garnish of Chef’s excellent green guerka sauce, to gild the spiral, and I set down the plate in front of the Beast, satisfied that no one could find my performance of my duty wanting.

I pick up the carved utensils and wait for the Beast to look at me, to give me a signal to start feeding him.  But he holds out his hand instead.  He does not want me to feed him after all.

Handing him the utensils, I feel a faint sense of failure.  I grimace to myself.  There is pleasure in doing my duty well, and in knowing I have disgraced neither my Station nor my fallen Lord.  But surely it is nothing to me whether or not I please the Beast.

He eats slowly, seeming to savor the saurin fruit in particular.  I make a mental note to tell Chef that the Beast favors it.  Perhaps he will like the yellow imiree that the Chef’s staff gathered from Helion’s storehouses as well.  It tastes similar, an underlying tartness to offset the dominant sweet note.  A sophisticated taste.  Surprising, then, that it appeals to a Beast.

While he eats, I turn my attention to the courtiers who surround us.  Vaako and his Dame sit at the Beast’s left hand, a sign of disfavor that seems to weigh on Vaako.  He says little and eats with his head down.  His pointed face is paler than usual.

I hope the food is grit in his mouth, the elixir acid in his guts.  May nothing ever taste good to him again, Traitor that he is.

At Vaako’s side, his Dame chats easily, banally, with Scales and his companion, Chandi.  Dame Vaako’s nacreous eyes rove to the head of the table often.  Her gaze is covetous, although whether of my seat or of the Lord Marshal’s chair itself, I cannot tell.  Poisonous creature.

Across the corner of the huge table, on the Beast’s right, sit Toal and Aimi.  They seem engrossed in each other.  Aimi cuts faizah wafers for the big commander and feeds them to him one at a time.  He makes a game of tilting his head back so that she can drop the slivers into his mouth, and of snapping at her fingers after she does.  His hand has strayed to her lap, curving around her thigh.  Are they already intimates?  The Lord Marshal has not been dead six hours and she has already given herself to him?  I would have encouraged her go to him, true . . . but so soon?

The Beast puts his utensils down, snapping my attention back to him.  My head spins a little.  A long day, full of too much strangeness.  I straighten and lift my chin.  I will not shame my station, no matter how tired or confused I am.

“What’s her name?” the Beast asks me in undertone, his eyes on Toal and Aimi.

“Aimi, Lord.  If her disporting displeases you—”

He shakes his head briefly.  “Toal asked me for her.  That usual?”

“No, Lord.”  He must fear having to sanction every union in the Armada.  “He doubtless only asked because Aimi was Fourth Concubine to Lord Zhylaw.”

The Beast tilts his head to one side, still watching Aimi feed Toal.  “You’re gettin’ smoother at that.”

“At what, Lord?”

“Callin’ him Zhylaw instead of _my_ Lord.”

I bow my head to hide my chagrin.  A terrifyingly perceptive Beast.

“Who’s on the far side of Scalp-Taker?”

I do not need to lift my head to look down the table.  I’ve already memorized where everyone is sitting.  “The two women on his left are his concubines, Kanike and Ferona—”

The Beast makes a low noise.  Amusement, I think.  “Thought I was the only one with a concubine.”

Nothing.  He knows _nothing_.  How can such a man sit on the Throne?

“Any of the Lord’s officers may take a concubine, as well as a companion.”

“What’s the difference?”

“A concubine is a servant, Lord.  Trained to minister to her lord in all ways.”  Once she would have born her Lord his children, but no longer.  “A concubine devotes herself to her Lord for life.  Only death can separate them.  A companion.”  I look up, making sure I catch Dame Vaako’s eye.  “Is merely a companion.”

She does not react, but I know she has heard me.  I hope it galls her.

“Mmm.”  I do not have to look at him to know that cruel amusement has returned to his glacial eyes, his mobile mouth.  I drop my eyes back to my folded hands.  “Past them?” he asks.

Past Kanike and Ferona sit the coven of purifiers, their purple and black robes of office drawn around them like bat’s wings.  I do not need to hear them to know that their voices are pitched nervously, to see them to know that their gestures are abbreviated by tension.  Edellis sits among them, doubtless as tense as any of them.  He is the keeper of the Scepter, third among the purifiers and so within striking distance of First.

I feel a passing twinge that the Purifier Principal no longer sits among us.  He was always kind to me, and although I avoided contact with all of the purifiers after Edellis began his persistent advances, I once counted the Purifier among my few true friends.  Like Tomoetu, he helped me during those first days of wearing the Collar, assisting me in finding my way through the pain towards spiritual peace.  He was a great man, as close a man as any to my Lord Marshal, with many demands on his time.  Too many to waste his time comforting and educating the Lord Marshal’s newest Concubine.  But he did, and I was always grateful to him.

“Bialy sits next to Ferona.  He was second under the former Purifier Principal—”

The Beast grunts in recognition.  Did he meet the Purifier?  Know him?  I would like to ask if he knows what happened, how the Purifier met his end on that strange planet where the sun rises in a maelstrom of ash and fire.  But now is not the time or place for such questions.

“Bialy’s companion Thaline sits beside him.  Next to Thaline is Edellis, third among the purifiers, and beyond him, Cengis, the fourth.”

“’Cross the table?”

“Master of Arms Varkony and his companion Tavian.  Master Navigator Fadei.  Master Builder Vinay and his companion, Sanne.  And Master Craftsman Akari.”

“Far end?”

At the far pole, Life to balance unLife.  “Second Master Healer Hiuyen.”

Hiuyen sits in for Tomoetu, who must still be recovering.  Tomoetu loves feasts.  He wouldn’t have missed this one unless he was incapacitated.  Or dead.  Sudden fear shoots through me.  But no, one of his acolytes would have sent me word if that was the case.

The Beast is silent for a moment, doubtless surveying his domain, although I do not raise my head to find out.  Out of the corner of my lowered eyes, I notice the Beast’s empty plate.  I beckon to the novice who bore the Tray of Leaves.

“A dish of Chef’s gingered ice for the Lord Marshal,” I tell the boy, who hurries off.  The officers and their companions are still eating their main course, so the Servants have not yet brought forth the dessert, but Chef will have prepared the gingered ice already, knowing how the courtiers favor it.  And ginger will aid the Beast’s digestion.

The boy returns in a moment with a crystal plate mounded with the golden-brown ice.  A sprig of guerka leaves adorns the ice and I smile at Chef’s thoughtfulness.  An artful touch.  And guerka is excellent for the digestion.

The Beast picks up the Requiem spoon that Chef has provided with the dish and takes an appreciative taste.

“Good,” he says, his tone so low it is barely more than a black echo from the depths of his chair.  “Everyone always sit in the same places?”

Doubtless he wants to memorize their places for future feasts.  Unfortunately, it will not be that easy for him.  He will need someone familiar with the court by his side for some time to come.  I would suggest that he replace me with one of the more experienced courtiers instead of a recent convert, but that is not my place.

“No, Lord.  The commanders sit according to the Lord Marshal’s favor.  The rest at their pleasure.  All three purifiers do not usually attend, but they will do so until you name a new Purifier Principal.”

“It’s not automatic?”

“No, Lord.  The lower ranks are ordered according to ability, but a Purifier Principal may be appointed only by the Lord Marshal.”

The Beast makes that low noise in his throat.  It is oddly expressive, like his mouth.  The deeper and more resonant the noise, the closer it comes to approval, I think.  A higher, humming noise indicates skepticism.  This noise is deep.

“Any thoughts?”

Several.  But none I wish to share in front of Vaako’s Snake, who is, doubtless, listening intently.

I lean forward and being making the Beast another cup of tea, although his current cup is no more than half-empty.  The Beast watches me silently, accepting the fresh cup when I pass it to him.

He takes a sip of the tea and makes the deep rumble again.  “Gotta hand it to you, Liaden.  You’re good at your job.”

I sit back on my heels and bow my head, as is proper when honored.  If the honor was not from the Beast, it would swell me with pride.  My Lord Marshal never praised me so.  He expected me to do my duty with utmost skill and ability at all times.  Anything less was failure to be punished by the Collar.  I could not exceed his expectations, because he expected me always to excel.

It is no surprise that the Beast expects less.

The Beast’s hand falls to my neck again, scaldingly hot with the heat of his teacup.  One long finger works over the links of the Collar, tracing the lower edge where it rises from my skin.  It is all I can do to hold still under his hand.  Tiny sparks race along my skin, flare behind my eyes.  The Collar, no doubt objecting to the touch of a false Lord.  But it does not sear the way it would if I were being punished, or if a man other than my Lord laid hands on me.

Perhaps it is as confused as I am.

A slither across the table warns me, gives me time to look up and gauge the Snake’s expression before she speaks.  She almost always writhes before entering a verbal fray.  I wonder if she knows that she betrays her intentions this way.

“If you’re not eating, Liaden,” the Snake begins, all fake throaty purr.  She knows I’m fasting.  She made it her business to find out as much about a Concubine’s duties as she could before she tried for our places.  Gennica, foolish enough to tell her what she could not find in the public files, nearly reaped a fitting reward when the Snake tried to poison her first.  I would have let Gennica pay with her life, but my Lord Marshal was more forgiving.

“Perhaps you would consent to entertain us,” the snake concludes, leaning forward and resting her chin on her gloved hand.  A coquette’s gesture.  False and hollow.  It amazes me that any could be fooled by her.

The Beast shifts in his chair.  “Entertain?”  His growl is so low that Dame Vaako blinks at him while she puzzles out the word.

She smiles, a gesture that would reveal fangs if her appearance reflected her nature.  “Hasn’t Liaden told you?  She has the most beautiful voice.  Our . . . former Lord Marshal prized her above all others for it.  And for her other . . . talents.”

I hope she screams in the darkness of the Void before it eats her.  Let us hear how _sweet_ her voice is.

“I devote all my talents to the service of my Lord Marshal,” I say.

“As do we all,” the Snake retorts, her sloe eyes held wide in an attempt at innocence.

Beside her, Vaako shifts uncomfortably again, spots of dusky color appearing high on his cheeks.

The Beast glances at me.  His eyes are narrowed, but not with amusement, and I wonder if I have somehow offended him.  “You sing something other than Daixian dirges?” he asks.

His memory is as frightening as his insight.  “Yes, Lord.”

“All right, then.”

Finally, finally he removes his hand from my neck.  I straighten into a better posture and smile at Vaako and his Snake.  “Maybe this will please Dame Vaako and her lord.”

I sing, softly, sweetly and without such inflection that anyone not listening closely to the words would notice my intent, the ballad of Oltovm and Daguan the Despised.

It is an old ballad, little known.  I learned it from a recording in the Concubines’ histories.  I have never sung it to anyone before.  When she does not recognize the first few lines, Dame Vaako tosses her head and returns to her conversation with Chandi.  But Vaako listens, and when I sing of Daguan’s traitorous attempt to garrote his Lord Marshal, the blood-flush of Vaako’s neck darkens to purple.  He sets down his utensils, silently but with such restrained force that he snaps the metal spoon he holds.  Dame Vaako glances over at him, both a query and a rebuke in the roll of her eyes, but he looks away.  His tormented eyes search along the table.  Searching, perhaps, for absolution.

I pray he finds none.  In this life or the next.

Vaako’s eyes rise to meet those of the Beast.

The Beast has been listening, too.  His hands circle his teacup, thumbs moving absently over the filigree in a hypnotizing rhythm.  Under heavy lids, his eyes move slowly back and forth, a pair of silver pendulums.  But he is neither entranced by my singing nor distracted by it.  He is perfectly aware of all around him, and when Vaako lifts his eyes to the Beast, the Beast returns his commander’s gaze.

Vaako’s throat works.  No sound comes out, but his lips frame the words, “Forgive me.”

My eyes dart to the Beast’s face.  He would not . . .

The Beast holds Vaako’s eyes for a moment, his face grave, his mobile mouth set.  Then he nods.  Once.

The song dies in my throat.  He cannot.  He dare not.  He forgives a traitor greater than Daguan?  A traitor all the more despised for betraying the very Lord Marshal who honored him above all others?

I stutter and try to pick up the melody again but the Beast growls at me, “You made your point, Liaden.  Sing somethin’ else.”

I drop my eyes to my hands, clenched in my skirts, to hide the outrage I cannot keep from showing on my face.

“Yes, Lord.  What would please you?”  I ask, dissembling until I can regain control of myself, but also to drive home the point that the Beast is an outsider, an unbeliever, who does not know our traditions or our songs.

The Beast chuckles into his tea.  “Somethin’ a little less loaded.”

I pick the most banal song I can think of.  An Idalee chant I learned while still on Tarenge.  It is droning and monotonous and I hope it bores through his ears and into his brain like an auger.

When I finish, the Beast glances at me.  “Nice voice.  You can sing some more for me . . . later.”

Something about the way he says it makes me shrink back from him.

Across the table, Dame Vaako laughs.

Before I can meet those hateful eyes, there is a flurry of movement.  Vaako rears up so suddenly and unexpectedly that his stone chair flies backwards into two Servants of the Table who are clearing plates.  The plates fall with a clatter.  Thankfully they are metal and do not break.  The Servants are not so lucky.  One of them falls to the ground under the heavy chair and I hear the unmistakable crack of bone.

But no one takes their eyes off Vaako, who has hauled his Dame out of her chair by her upper arm.  She twists in his grip, irate, but also, disgustingly, aroused.  I can see it in the glitter of her eyes, the flush of her gilded cheeks.

“Forgive me, my Lord,” Vaako grits out.  “I have neglected my personal duties for too long.  I find myself needing to remind my companion of her _place_.”

The Beast nods, some unfathomable emotion that he does not let show anywhere else lighting his eyes.  Those silver strobes follow Vaako and his protesting partner out through the door that a Servant holds open for them.  Then they flick back to me.

“Think we’ve all had enough fun for tonight,” he says.

I bow my head.  “Yes, Lord.  It is traditional to close the feast with a final toast to the Dead and a last offering.”

The Beast picks up the Basilica Cup before I can offer it to him.  “To all of our Dead.”

The commanders and officers raise their glasses.  “To the Threshold,” they intone, their voices ominously resonant in the long chamber.

The drops of Cark that the Beast pours into the dish I hold for him ignite as before, and this time I know I have not applied the lighter, because it is still tucked inside my glove.

My mind whirling, I rise after the Beast, and barely notice when he pauses to hold his arm out for me.


	7. Chapter 7

“Suppose I should thank you,” the Beast growls as we walk through the upper corridor to the Lord Marshal’s chambers.  Below us, the Great Hall is empty, and the balconies are nearly so.  I catch the purple of a purifier’s robe in the dimness ahead of us, but then he is gone and we are alone.

“Thank me for what, Lord?”

“Flushing out Vaako like that.”

A useless effort, since the Beast forgave the Traitor.  But I try hard to keep any bitterness out of my voice.  “You are most welcome, Lord.”

His hand closes over mine, where it rests in the crook of his arm.  “It wasn’t a compliment, Liaden.”

I look up him, so astonished my mouth hangs ajar.  What have I done wrong?  “But I—”

His shining eyes regard me coldly.

“It was a cheap shot, Liaden.  A gut wound.  An’ you know it.”  His nostrils flare as though I have suddenly emitted a bad odor.  Through tightened lips he says, “Don’t do it again.”

“Yes, Lord.”

I trail him into the outer chamber, my head down, shocked and ashamed by his rebuke.  My Lord Marshal never reprimanded me for sparring with the courtiers, no matter how underhanded it became.  He encouraged it.  That I did so rarely was merely because it was beneath my station.  But to _ignore_ treachery?  To forgive it!  It is unfathomable.

As unfathomable as a Beast who values fair play.

Confused, I give Tiguan a brief nod when he opens the Inner Doors for us.  Inside the sanctum, the Beast stops abruptly, and I halt automatically beside him, before I lift my eyes and register what he has seen.

Somehow, during the short course of the feast, the Master Builder’s apprentices have performed a miracle.  I would never have believed the Sarcophagus could have been removed.  Not without dismantling the entire chamber, and the corridor beyond.  But it is gone as if it never had been.  There is not even a mark on the floor to show its passing.  A huge bed, draped and canopied in black, sits where the Sarcophagus was.

I will have to reward Vinay.  It should be the Beast’s duty, but he will not do it.  Does not know to do it.  I will have to think on a suitable reward.

“Better,” says the Beast, surveying the bed.  “Get rid of that, and this place will be livable.”

I follow his eyes to the Ceiling, then shake my head.  Surely he only seeks to goad me, to punish me for what he inexplicably sees as bad behavior.  How can he object to resting under such an inspiring vision?

The Beast straightens his arm and I take that as a signal to slip from his side.  Collecting the Lord Marshal’s nightrobe, I drape it carefully over the edge of the bed and approach the Beast, in order to remove his feast attire.  I pause to appreciate the ceremonial tunic and trousers.  They have worn well through the feast, without a single crease.  The fitted sleeves of the undershirt display the Beast’s massive shoulders to good effect.  The trousers drape closely around his huge thighs, displaying the muscle beneath, without binding.  Where did Halen find clothing of these dimensions on such short notice?  Truly, I will have to think of generous rewards for all of the Servants of the Chamber.  They have surpassed themselves today, under trying circumstances.

And after I do, I will claim my own reward.  To declare my Due Time and follow my Lord Marshal.  Doubtless the Beast will be happy to be rid of me by then, since I displease him so greatly.

The Beast turns his head to follow me as I move around behind him.  But he says nothing when I open the spine clasp of his tunic and ease it off his shoulders.  His breathing deepens when I reach around his waist to undo his trousers and slide them down his legs.  Perhaps he is tired.  I certainly am.

His naked body is truly impressive, like one of Valjean’s sculptures.  Under smooth golden skin, muscles lie in ridges over his shoulders and down his back.  The slight roundness of his buttocks gives way to the hard planes of his hips and thighs.  My hand gravitates to his warm skin of its own accord, but I remember myself before I touch him improperly.  I only brush my fingertips over one of the bruises that still mar his back.

“This looks better already.  You heal quickly,” I say, tracing the faded, green edge of the bruise.

“Good thing,” the Beast grumbles.

I carry the ceremonial uniform into the wardrobe and attach it to a magnetic hanger.  A few garments hang in the otherwise empty racks.  Halen must have removed my Lord Marshal’s clothes to make way for the new things the Weavers make for the Beast.  They have already completed a full set of mailed robes for tomorrow’s rituals.  They must have labored through curfew to get the robes ready.

I will have to think long and hard on suitable rewards for all of them.

When I return, the Beast has already climbed in between the fresh black sheets.  The nightrobe I laid out for him still lies on the edge of the bed.  He ignores me as I advance, staring up at the ceiling with his arms behind his head.

“Is there anything else you require before you retire, Lord?”  My Lord Marshal liked a goblet of warmed, spiced Cark before bed.

“No.”

If he is ready to sleep then he should be in his nightrobe.  I pick it up off the edge of the bed and hold it out to him.  “Lord?”

“Stop tryin’ to put me in that dress.”  He glances over at me.  “Hurry up and change.”

Change into what?  “Lord?”

“Go on, Liaden.  Stop stallin’.”

Genuinely confused, I drift through the nearby archway and into my own chamber.  His directions make no sense.  Does he want me to return to his bedside?  For what purpose?  Perhaps he wants me to watch over him while he sleeps.  That is not unheard of.  One of Baylock’s Concubines watched over him at all times, even when he slept.

Without clear direction from the Beast, I fall back into my usual toilette.  I will forego my bath tonight; I am too tired.  But I will not miss my evening prayers.

I remove my gown and brush it off carefully.  There are a few flecks of ash on the sleeve, but they do not stain when I wipe them away.  Pleased that the Servants will not have to clean the gown after such a short use, I hang it in my wardrobe.  I withdraw a nightgown and slip it over my head.  The silken fabric moves over my skin, a sensuous whisper, doubly welcome after the feast gown’s fitted confines.

Feeling unencumbered and light-headed, I move to my dressing table.  Freed of the net and Rift clasp, my braided hair falls to my waist.  I run my fingers through it until it lies in a loose black wave over my shoulders and down my back.  I should brush it now, but I am so tired . . .

“Liaden, what the fuck is taking you so—”

The Beast’s gruff tones spin me around in surprise.  I did not hear him approach.

He stands in the archway to my chamber, filling it with his imposing physical form.  One hand grips the edge of the arch, as though he would tear the very walls out of his way.  His eyes are still narrowed with irritation, but something else slides through them and across his face.  It is an avid, intent expression.

It freezes me, turns the blood in my veins gelid.  What does he want?

He moves towards me, silent despite his bandaged, damaged feet.  One hand reaches out and catches a hank of my hair.  He runs the strands through his fingers, tugging slightly, so my scalp prickles.  The Collar gives a warm pulse for no reason I can comprehend.

“You been holding out on me,” he says.  His voice has dropped into a new register, husky and impossibly deep.

_A Concubine reserves her glory for her Lord and reveals her full beauty to no other._

“No, Lord, it is tradition for—”

“Shut up and come to bed.”

He turns, still holding my hair, and tugs me back into the sanctum.  I know how quickly he can move when he wants.  I have seen the powerful stride of his long legs.  But he walks slowly, keeping me beside him, not dragging me, although he keeps his hold on my hair, as we cross the few meters to the bed.

He climbs into the bed and pulls me after him.

“Lord?”

I have never been in the Lord Marshal’s bed.  I rarely even touched the Sarcophagus.

“Liaden, get in bed.  You’d think you never done this before.”

I haven’t.  I’ve never lain beside a man.  Never slept next to another warm, breathing body.  Is that what he wants of me?

He slides between the sheets, black silk swallowing his golden skin.  His hold on my hair drags me down beside him, until I kneel on the bed.

“Do you want me to watch over you while you sleep, Lord?  It would be my honor.”

“You got a _very_ strange idea of honor.  Lie down.”

I stretch out next to him, but wonder how I will keep myself awake through the night if I am lying prone.  I have held all-night vigils before, for Fainche and for Commander Gaige when he was killed in the attack on Jeranda.  It is much easier to stay awake if one is sitting up, or better, standing.  Perhaps the Collar will help keep me awake if I nod in dereliction of my duty.

“Lights,” the Beast growls, and I turn off the lights hastily.

I lie in the dark, listening to the sounds of the Beast’s small motions as he settles into the sheets, the deep rush of his breathing.  Strange and unfamiliar sounds.

“C’mere, Liaden.”  A tug on my hair.

I slide towards him obediently.  Maybe he’s cold and wants me to warm him.  He is naked, and he is not wrong about the chill of the Basilica.

“Lord, if you would let me put the nightrobe on you, you would be warmer.”

“Told you to forget about that fucking dress.  I’m not cold.”

Then why does he want me so close?

His hands close on me, one on my hip and the other moving up through my hair to gather a great handful of it in his grasp.  He turns me, rolling me away from him, and then his warm body presses against my back.  His knee pushes my legs apart.  The motions and position are similar enough to claiming – although I should be kneeling before him instead of lying down – that I go rigid.

He chuckles, low and warm in my ear.  “Relax, Liaden.  I’m too tired.”

Too tired for what?  Does he plan to use me like a common whore?  Surely he does not intend to _claim_ me.  He is no true Lord Marshal.  He has not been Purified.  He does not know the rituals.  He does not control the Collar.  He could not . . .

“I said, relax.”  This time it’s a growl, and I force myself to obey.  He arranges me for his comfort.  His elbow slides under my head, hand still buried in my hair.  His other arm lies heavily around my waist.  His thigh nestles between mine.

It is strangely comfortable, the position he puts me in.  Strangely soothing to be held so close, to feel his warmth soak into me through the thin barrier of my nightgown.

“Liaden,” he whispers, rough with exhaustion.  “Sing me somethin’.  _Not_ that second song.”

I smile into the darkness.  One small victory among so many losses today.

I have not said my evening prayers, and from the way he is holding me, it is unlikely that I will be able to say them as I should, on my knees, in the Lord Marshal’s private chapel.  But I can sing them, and I do, softly and without words, which might offend him, unbeliever that he is.

By the time I reach the end of the second stanza, his breathing is heavy and even in my ear.  I finish my prayers silently, so that I do not disturb him.

And then I lie in the dark, in the arms of a Beast, and try to sleep.

 

The Beast’s stirring wakes me.  He has moved me in my sleep, so that I lie against his side with my head on his shoulder.  His hand, still wrapped in my hair, twitches, tugging.  His other hand rests on my hip, pressing me against him, so I can feel the tremors running through him.  I lift my head as much as his hold allows me.  Do his wounds pain him?

I search his face, contorted in the Ceiling’s faint glow.  His eyes are slitted, a faint glow moving under the flare of dark lashes.  The silver shine flickers, shifting as his eyes move back and forth.  The movements are spasmodic.

He is dreaming.

Even in sleep, even in dreams, his eyes are open, watchful, wary.  There is no escape from his silver gaze.

“Lord?” I whisper.

“Kyra—”  A harsh, guttural whisper.

I touch his chest tentatively.  My fingers brush his skin, sleep-warm and sweating.  “Lord?”

“Kyra, are you with me?”

His words to the woman who died on the floor of the Great Hall.  The woman I burned at his command.  A woman he mourns.  A new initiate, one of the Faithful, and yet someone important to him.  Did he care for her?  Did he invade the Necropolis only to reclaim her?  Has his usurpation of the Throne been no more than a catastrophic series of coincidences?

“Lord,” I say a little more loudly, hoping to rouse him from whatever nightmare grips him.

His hand tightens suddenly in my hair, dragging me up until I am nose-to-nose with him.

“Are you with me?” he growls, silver eyes wide and searching.

What will quiet him?  What will send him back to dreamless sleep?

What he wanted to hear from her.

“Yes, I’m with you.”  I raise my hand to touch his face.  To soothe him back to sleep.  His hand clamps on my wrist, bearing it down to his chest.  But his grip on my hair slackens.  His eyelids close, and the body under mine relaxes.  Holding my hand over his heart, he settles back to sleep.

I shift until I can put my head back down on his shoulder.  The things that kept me awake before, the warmth of him, the clean smell of his skin, even the pressure of his hand in my hair, are oddly comforting now.  They lull me back to sleep.


	8. Chapter 8

I wake in an expanse of black sheets, far too vast to be my own bed.  Blinking, I try to remember where I am and how I came to be there.  The Beast’s bed.  At his command.  But where is _he_?

Sitting up, I find him at the Lord Marshal’s desk.  He wears the black and silver skullcloth I have seen my Lord Marshal wear so many nights.  The sight sends a pang through me.  My Lord Marshal wore it so that he could receive the sound from his lens while he worked through the night, without keeping me awake.  Doubtless the Beast wears it for the same reason.  An oddly considerate gesture from a Beast.

The great blue lens on the desk in front of him runs with color and movement.  I’m at the wrong angle to see what shapes move within, but it could be anything.  The Lord Marshal’s lens has unrestricted access to everything in the Basilica’s system.

Except the Concubines’ histories, which can only be accessed from my lens.

I rise slowly, so as not to startle the Beast.  In an argent flash, his eyes flick to me.  He nods, acknowledging me, but returns his gaze to the lens.  Not wanting to disturb him, I pad quietly towards my own chamber.  Something, an intuition, a faint chill sliding over my skin, makes me glance back at him.  From this angle I can see that he wears nothing other than the transceiver skullcap.  He sits naked in the great desk chair.  Gooseflesh dots his arms.

Glancing back at the bed, I see that the Lord’s nightgown still lies draped across the corner of the bed.

Obstinate Beast.

Clucking softly to myself, I alter my course for the Wardrobe.  Two silken holobroidered robes hang among the garments there, which seem to have multiplied while we slept.  Halen must have used the secret door at the back of the wardrobe to bring them through.  I smile to myself and make a mental note to mention Halen’s diligence to the Beast when I have a chance.  Halen is a good Servant, despite his irritating mannerisms.

As I turn back for the door, a short row of footwear on the floor catches my eye.  Three pairs of boots, all sizeable enough to accommodate the Beast’s gargantuan feet, and next to them, two pairs of slippers.

Grinning, I take robe and slippers back into the sanctum and kneel next to the Beast.  He glances down at me, but does not register what I’m doing until I lift his bandaged foot and encase it in a slipper.

He chuckles.  His hand falls to my head and strokes my hair while I put the other slipper on him.  When I rise and hold out the robe, he stands and lets me wrap it around him.  I turn to go, but he catches my wrist and pulls me down into his lap.

He turns the chair back to the desk, squaring me in his lap with his hands on my hips.  I hold myself stiff, unsure of what he wants from me, unused to being held this way.  He positions me with the same deliberate casualness he used when we were in his bed.  His arm wraps around my middle, his hand heavy on my hip.  I feel his face close to my neck.  Hear his deep inhalation as he scents me the way he has before.  A warm brush of skin along mine, over the expanse of neck and shoulder left bare by my sleeveless gown.  His free hand settles in my hair again, fingers tightening, tugging, guiding my head back, so he can continue to look into the lens over my shoulder.

Held so firmly, there is nothing I can do but relax against him.  In the lens before us, the battle of Jeranda rages.  It is nearly over now.  Toal’s legions close on the capital, where the defenders have gathered to make their last stand.  Toal’s troops surround them, a burnished black wave that slowly crashes over the blue and white-armored defenders.  The lens focuses on Toal and a squad of Elites, methodically smashing their way through a line of droids to reach the retreating humans behind them.  The humans fall just as surely as the machines before Toal’s relentless assault.

“Efficient,” the Beast says, and I can hear an edge of admiration in his voice.

“As is Halen,” I murmur.  “He had those slippers made while you slept.”

The Beast chuckles.  “I noticed.”

“Please be tolerant of him.  Of all of the Servants of the Chamber.  Until they adjust.  They have served the same Lord for nearly twenty years.”

“I plan to be.”

Reassured that I have done my duty to Halen and the rest, I relax, and cross my arms over his.

The view in the lens shifts, showing Scalp-Taker and a legion of Elites on the other side of the capital.  The contrast between the two commanders is marked, even to my eye.  Toal exhibits perfect control, even in the middle of mayhem.  Scalp-Taker _is_ mayhem, plunging in and out of each group of defenders with screaming abandon, heedless of the troops around him.  Killing and killing and killing until no one stands before him, and then, lost in his murderous rage, raising his war axe on a hapless Elite before his own troops stop him.

“He loves Damalis,” I say quietly, repeating what my Lord Marshal told me several times.  “But he loves killing more.”

“Yeah, I see that.”  The lens flickers and data scrolls across it.  “From Indalia originally.”

I don’t understand what importance Scalp-Taker’s homeworld could have to the Beast’s ruminations, so I let him contemplate in silence for several minutes.  The lens continues to scroll while we sit.  Scalp-Taker’s long record of service is replaced by information about the Elites in his command.

The movement of his hand, tracing a slow circle on my hip, warns me that he is coming out of his ruminations.

“Ever heard of Indalia?” he asks.

“No, Lord.”

“Started off as a penal Colony.  Before the three max slams on this arm of the galaxy were built.”  His breath feathers warm across my neck.  “Maybe he and I got something in common after all.”

What could they possibly have in common?  “You’re descended from convicts, Lord?”

The Beast snorts.  “Not exactly.”

Confused, I open my mouth to ask what he means.  But then it fits together in my mind.  The scars on his ankles.  The austerity of his life.  The novelty of having someone serve him.  _He_ is the convict.

“How?” I whisper, stunned.

“What’s that?”

“How did a convict end up on the Throne of the Necromongers?”

“That’s a long story.”  The Beast chuckles.  “For another time.”

The lens flickers again and splits into the images of the three remaining purifier elite.  “So what about these three?” he asks.  “I gotta name one of them the new Purifier, right?”

“Yes, Lord.”

“You got some thoughts on that?  That you didn’t want to share in front of everyone?”

I nod, a gesture abbreviated by his hand in my hair.  “Lord Zhylaw often asked my opinion, but never in front of his commanders.  Lest he appear to be guided by his Concubine.”

The Beast makes his low noise.  Approval.  “Yeah, and?”

“Cengis is the least of the purifier elite, and the most recent convert.  But I often heard the Purifier Principal speak of him to Lord Zhylaw.  He has a clarity of mind and a grasp of the higher tenets of the Faith that the others cannot match.  And Cengis is not a young man.  He is not prone to a young man’s excesses of zeal.”  I purse my mouth sourly, thinking of Edellis.

“What about the other two?”

“Bialy is second.  The Purifier claimed that Bialy would always be second.  I do not know why, Lord.”  I could speculate.  Bialy has always seemed to me without particular vision or drive.  But speculating is not my duty.

“Whaddo you think?”

Unless he makes it my duty.  “I think Bialy uninspired, Lord.  He has none of the necessary passion or vision.  He cannot bring men flocking to the cause merely by speaking the Faith to them, the way the Purifier Principal should.”

The deep, approving noise again.  “What about this one?”  He reaches out and places two fingers on Edellis’s image.  I look away from Edellis’s blue eyes, fevered and greedy even in the hologram.

“Edellis is the keeper of the Scepter.  A mark of great favor among the purifiers.  The Purifier thought highly of him,” I say.  All truths.

“But?”

A night’s rest has only made his whetted perception sharper, if possible.  “But he lacks the deep commitment to the Faith and his station the others have shown.  Edellis would put his own interests first.”

Also all truths, and yet still not the Truth.  The Truth which would have gotten Edellis executed if my Lord Marshal had ever discovered it.  I do not know how the Beast would feel about Edellis’s intentions, but for the sake of the man’s life, I keep my silence, as I have these years since Edellis made his lusts known to me.

The Beast only chuckles.  “Can’t hold that against him.”

I can.  No matter how deep his professed adoration – an adoration incomprehensible to me, especially from one who knows me so little – he had no right to confess his desire to me, or to try to sway me into complicity.  For a man who knows that life, this Life, is suffering, he has shown remarkably little interest in suffering his forbidden passion in silence.

And his claim to know the secret of the Collar, to be able to remove it so I could give myself to him . . . 

Absurd.  Ridiculous.  Impossible.

The Beast taps his fingers once on Edellis’s image.  Then he settles into the chair and pulls me against him, his arm returning to my waist.  He seems to be ruminating again, and I am loathe to disturb him, particularly now that I am wrapped in his warmth.  But there is something I’ve wondered since the feast last night.  And anything that distracts my thoughts from Edellis is welcome.

“Lord, would you tell me something?”

“Yeah, what?”

“There is . . . there is a rumor that the old Purifier was with you on the burning planet.  That he remained behind when the Legionnaires ran.  I wondered . . . the Purifier was my friend—”

“Mmm.”  The Beast shifts, settling deeper in his chair, pulling me a little tighter against him.  “Yeah, he did.  Saved my life.”

“He did?”  I smile at the thought.  That sounds like the Purifier.  He never gave up on anyone he had a chance to convert.  “What happened to him?”

Sudden dread grips my heart.  What if the Beast left him behind?  What if he is still trapped in that terrible place, so far from Necropolis and his flock?  With everything else that has happened, I don’t think I could bear to know that he is marooned somewhere far from everything and everyone that has meaning for him.

“Killed himself,” the Beast says.  “Walked into a firestorm.”

His words suck the breath out of my body, the warmth out of my limbs.  He’s lying.  He must be lying.  The Purifier would never have killed himself.  He knew the Campaign was far from over.  There was work yet to be done.  It was not his Due Time.  How could he have killed himself?

“Sorry if he was a friend of yours,” the Beast says.

“Why?” I breathe, so softly I’m not sure if he will hear me.

But he does.  His hearing as acute as his other senses.  “Remembered who he was.”

“He was the Purifier!”

“Yeah, but all you Necros begin as somethin’ else.  He remembered what he was.”

“What?” I ask softly, still trying to understand, to find some logic or reason in the incomprehensible death of my friend.

“He was Furyan.”

I shake my head.  “Furya is a dead planet.  No one comes from there.”

“I do.”

That silences me.  That rumor was too bizarre to be true, I thought.  But he says it is true, and I can see no reason for him to lie to me.

And the rumor that the Purifier remained behind willingly while the Legionnaires ran also seemed too bizarre to be true.  But the Beast says it is also true, and why would he lie?  The Purifier remained behind to save the Beast, his fellow Furyan.  And then he immolated himself for no reason I can understand.  Did he fall from the Faith?  After helping so many like me overcome their doubt, did he finally begin to doubt himself?  I put a hand over my aching eyes and try to puzzle through what could have happened to my friend.

The Beast says nothing more, merely holds me.  His warmth is animal warmth.  The comfort of being held so tightly against his body is a mammalian comfort.  Antithetical to the cold purity of the Dead.  Yet I am warmed and comforted all the same.

Finally he breaks the silence.  “So you think, Cengis.”

His words pull me back to the present.  Back to my duty.  “I do, Lord.  But with honor to Bialy and Edellis, so that none think them lacking.”

“What kind of honor?”

“The purifiers do not reveal their private rituals to the Faithful.  Not even to the Lord Marshal.  But I think that once he is named, Cengis could honor Bialy and Edellis in ways the lesser acolytes would appreciate.”  My gaze falls on the Beast’s weapons belt, which lies across the corner of the desk.  The sight of Maroj and Marened, sitting in their blue-tooled sheaths, sparks a memory.  “And perhaps you could do them a more direct honor.  Lord Zhylaw once gave the Purifier an ancient sword, Ishiver the Screamer, as a mark of special favor for converting the Zadorians without losing a single life.  You could do something similar.”

The memory of the Purifier showing me the sword and telling me the story of the conversion of Zador brings a twinge of sorrow, but not the onslaught of emotion that first hearing of his death brought.  With so few words and fewer gestures, the Beast has comforted me.

“How’d I do all this?  There some Necro ritual for it?”

“Yes, Lord.  We are a people who value spectacle.  It should be done in the Great Hall, with the court in attendance.  The purifiers will kneel before you, give you their obeisance.  There are ceremonial words that I will find for you.  But in essence, you laud Cengis’s accomplishments, and then name him first among purifiers.  The other purifiers will robe him in high vestments and make their obeisances to him.  Then you give him the cap of office and it is done.  It is not a long or complex ritual, but it should be done with honor and solemnity.”

The Beast’s hand moves in my hair, stroking the back of my skull, tugging on my hair in a way that stirs me strangely.  “You’re just a font of information, Liaden,” he says, but there is warmth in his tone.

“I try.”

“Just doin’ your duty?”

“Yes, Lord.”

For reasons I cannot begin to guess, that seems to anger him.  The muscles against my back and shoulders tauten.  The Beast turns the chair abruptly, takes my hips in his hands, and pushes me to my feet.

“Lord?”  I brace one hand against the desk.  The sudden ejection from the heat of his body leaves me shivering and unsteady.  He glowers at me from the chair.

“Get dressed, Liaden.  I want breakfast.”

“But, the protocol . . .”

“What?”  He sounds angry and impatient.  What have I done to anger him?

“Every day that we are not at war, the Lord Marshal leads the Faithful in preparing for the great work of the Campaign.  The Legions will have begun to assemble by now.  They will expect you . . .” I trail off, finally quailing under his deepening glower.

“Expect me to do what?” he growls, but the glower fades a little.

“Lead them.  Every Necromonger trains in the arts of war.  The legions train every day, unless we are in the middle of an invasion.”

Grim humor suddenly curves the Beast’s mouth.  “’Least that’s somethin’ I know how to do.”

 

He objects when I try to clothe him in the etched and muscled cuirass and titanic spaulders the Weavers have worked so hard to make for him.  Barely able to carry one of the spaulders even with both hands, I set it down on the floor with a _thunk_.

“Won’t be able to move in those,” he growls.

“Your function is largely ceremonial,” I grit in answer.  Hauling the heavy armor out of the wardrobe and placating his unreasonable temper has shortened my own.  “You merely need to stand on the Lord’s platform and direct the training.  Lord Zhylaw never engaged in actual combat during training—”

“Maybe that’s why he’s stone dead.  I do things my own way.”

I stare at him, aghast that he would speak so disrespectfully of the holy dead.

“Get me that tunic from last night.”

“Your arms will be exposed,” I hiss.  “Dare you risk another wound like the one Vaako gave you?”

The Beast crosses his huge arms over his chest and glares at me.  “So much for obeying my every command, huh, Liaden?”

A stubborn, infuriating Beast.

Fuming, I turn on my heel and stalk back into the wardrobe.  The magnetic hangars snap and rattle when I yank the Dyneemal tunic from their grip.  I snatch a sleeveless vest down from another hanger.  If he wants his arms exposed, so be it.  But he should not wear the Dyneemal directly against his skin.  It will chafe his bruises raw.  And although it is no more than he deserves for being such an ill-tempered, unreasonable Beast, I am not so lax in my duty as to let him suffer.

He glowers at me when I offer him the vest, but lets me clothe him without further argument.  I buckle on his weapons belt, and stand back to survey my handiwork.  Despite my irritation, I have to admit that leaving his arms bare is a good choice.  His huge shoulder and arm muscles look more imposing bared than sporting any false metallic bulk.  I return to the wardrobe for the wrist bracers he wore when he defeated my Lord Marshal.  Cleaned and oiled, they lie on the display rack for his armor.  In my mind, I can see how the black bands at wrist and elbow will augment his hulking appearance.  And when I put them on him, I’m pleased to see that my imagination has not failed me.

That wicked, mercuric amusement returns to his eyes.  “Satisfied?”

“Yes, Lord.”

He grunts.  I quickly check the double chronometer, showing both Universal standard time and the forty-six hour day of Asylum, that runs around the edge of the desk lens like a giant sundial.  Oh-seven-fifty.  Training begins in ten minutes. I bow my head to indicate that I am done dressing him.

When he doesn’t move, I glance up at him.  “They will be waiting for you, Lord.”

“Where?”

Of course, he doesn’t know.  And I’m still in my nightgown.  Supremely unfit to guide him down to a room full of waiting Legionnaires.  I will be very late to lead the Concubines’ training.

“I will summon a Servant to show you, Lord.”

“Ain’t you comin’?”

“Yes, Lord.  But I need to change into my training uniform.”

The Beast’s expression shifts, becomes somehow even more wicked.  Predatory.

“I’ll wait,” he says.

Given his lurking presence in the sanctum, I hurry to shed my nightgown and don the fitted tunic, trousers and high boots that I wear for training sessions.  The faint sourness of my own sweat rises to me and I grit my teeth.  I was not able to bathe last night because of the Beast’s demands.  I slept warmer than I am used to, with the Beast’s body next to mine.  And I am too late to bathe this morning.  I will have to ask Aimi to be my sparring partner; she will not object to my smell.

The thought pulls me up short, making me sit down at my dressing table with unusual force.  Aimi and Gennica and Iloru are no longer Concubines.  They have no right to attend training.  I begin braiding my hair and my fingers catch in a snarl left by the Beast’s hands.  I grimace.  He has disrupted everything.  Destroyed everything that was good and comfortable and routine in my life.  Everything I believed to be true . . .

 _It does not matter_.  I have to say it to myself fiercely.  Over and over.  Like a mantra.  Until I believe it and am calm again.  One more day and I will declare my Due Time.  Then nothing the Beast does will matter.

I finish my braid and secure it with a soft clasp that will not get in my way during training.  Most of my weapons, I leave in their places on my dresser.  I only take a pair of Pins with me, secreted in the stiffened seam over each shoulder.  We train with dulled weapons: darts that hold no poison and pins that have no power.  The Rift clasp requires no particular skill, only great strength of will to open the Rift and force it closed again.  That I practice in secret, and alone.

Turning from my dressing table, I jolt.

The Beast stands in the archway of my chamber, leaning one huge, bare shoulder against the arch, his arms crossed over his chest.  He stands just far enough to the side that I could not see him in my mirror.  How did he get there without me hearing him?  How can such a big man move so silently?

He wears that same predatory expression.  Has he been standing there the whole time?  Watching me dress?

I straighten my shoulders and rise from my chair.  What if he has?  All he has seen is my naked body.  A shape he is certainly familiar with from holding me so close in the night.  Nor is there anything so exotic about my body that he will not have seen the same shape on dozens, perhaps hundreds, of women.  I know for a fact that my body is not so very different from his Kyra’s.  Except for the Collar of the Whip imbedded in my spine.  But my mirror tells me that it is not terribly disfiguring, just a segmented ribbon of silver running down my back.  That cannot be why he’s staring at me.  What makes his face so intent, his eyes so hot and hooded?

“Two things,” he says, in that abyssal rumble.  “One, don’t lecture me about leavin’ my arms bare if you’re gonna run around in this.”  He takes two prowling steps forward and runs his thumb and first finger along the sleeveless arm of my tunic.

I grimace.  “I’m hardly at risk of a wound like—”

“An’ two,” he continues, ignoring my protest.  “I’m givin’ you fair warning.”  He reaches behind me and trails two fingers up the back of my tunic, along my spine, from where the Collar begins at the small of my back to the nape of my neck.  He _was_ watching.  “I’m not gonna be too tired tonight.”

With his hand on my neck, he draws me toward him.  Still holding my eyes, he dips his head and brushes his mouth across mine.  Gently.  Once.  His mouth moist and hot.  And then a second time, his teeth dragging over my lower lip.

He releases me abruptly.  “Let’s go.”

Stunned, my mind reeling, my mouth still burning from the touch of his, I trail after him.  _I’m not gonna be too tired tonight_.  What does that mean?  Does he plan to use me?  Why?  My touch does not stir him.  Everything I do displeases him.  I know I am not as beautiful as Gennica or Iloru or even Aimi.  Is it that I’m simply convenient?

We pass through the outer chamber with my mind still turning over question after question for which I have no answer.  When we reach the main corridor, he falls back, and I move a step ahead to lead him to the training hall.  His hand settles on my neck, sliding under the cool weight of my braid, replacing it with a band of heat.

“How long’s this training usually last?” he asks.

How long?  Surely no longer than he has had his hands on me.  Hours.  Days.  Have I ever been free of this burning touch?

“Two standard hours, Lord.  More if we are on the eve of invasion and preparing for battle.  You set the pace.  The training masters will look to you.”

He grunts approvingly.  “You train along with the rest?”

I turn sharply down a branching corridor, hoping to unseat his hand with my sudden movement.  The hot weight on my neck shifts, but then resettles.  Worse, his thumb slides up the side of my neck, a caress that nearly sends me stumbling.  Why does he touch me?  And why does his touch unsettle me?  It should change nothing that he plans to use me.  It is merely another duty for me to perform to the best of my ability.

Why, then, have I taken a wrong turn, so distracted by his hand on my skin?

“Didn’t we just come this way?” he asks when I turn around, amusement enriching that baritone growl.

“Yes, Lord.  Forgive me.”  Grimacing, I lead him back the few steps to the correct passage.

“You didn’t answer me.”

What did he ask?  “I’m sorry, Lord, what did you want to know?”

“D’you train along with the rest?”

“No, I lead the Concubines’ training.”

“No women for me to train?”

Why would he ask such an odd question?  Perhaps he wants to look over the women warriors to see if there is a better candidate for his bed.  "Yes, Lord, there are a few women legionnaires.  And some of the Armada fighter pilots choose to train with the legions in case they are called on for ground combat.  Many of the pilots are women.”

“Mmm.  They’d do better training on their own.  Different strengths.  Different techniques.”

I nearly stumble again in surprise.  He’s right, of course.  Women do have different strengths, and I am careful to teach the Concubines to exploit them.  But my Lord Zhylaw said there was no place for a woman’s weakness in his army, and if a woman could not match a man’s strength, then she could not stand amongst the Legion Vast.  That is why there are so few women Legionnaires, and so many women pilots.  I had hoped to be one of them, before Zhylaw put the Collar on me.

I never expected, however, that a Beast would recognize a woman’s strengths.

“Sleep badly, Liaden?”

I glance up at him to gauge his expression, but it tells me nothing.  What is the impetus for such a question?  “N-no, Lord.”

“’Cause you seem a little unsteady this morning.”

 _Nothing_ I do pleases him.  Even when my small failures are his fault.  I gather myself, forcing my back straight, my head high.  “Forgive me, Lord.  I am preoccupied with the details of the ceremonies today.  I will endeavor to keep my mind focused on—”

The Beast chuckles.  “Relax, Liaden.”

The entrance to the training hall, guarded by two Elites, appears ahead of us.  _Now_ I could relax, if only he would take his hand off me.

The Elites bow when they see us, and fling the doors they guard wide.  The Beast’s step slows and I can tell that he is startled by the sight that lies within.

The training hall, second only in grandeur to the Great Hall and twice the size of any other space in Necropolis, is filled with rank upon rank of silent, armored Legionnaires.  They stand at attention, each gripping their war hammer and practice pulse weapons, facing the front of the hall.  Other than a faint susurrus of breathing, they make no sound.  A superbly trained army, drawn from the strength of a hundred worlds.

 _His_ army, now.

“Here you are, Lord.  If you will excuse me—”

“Yeah,” he whispers.  His eyes flick over the row upon row of armored backs in front of us, all facing the dais at the far end of the hall.  Where he will stand to lead them.

His mouth works, tightens.  Suddenly, I see not the man he has become over the last few hours.  The man who admits to pain and accepts the small comforts I give him.  The man who likes to hold me close and cannot seem to keep his hands off my skin.

I see the Beast again.  The indomitable warrior who admits no pain.  He will train, and train hard, never acknowledging the bruises under his tunic or the terrible sores on his feet.  The Beast needs no one and nothing, and does not appreciate the presence of a woman at his side.

I am warrior-bred and warrior trained.  But I still find myself preferring the man he is when he is not quite the Beast.

I bow my head, to slide out from under his hand and escape to the relative sanctuary of the Concubines’ training chamber.

The Beast’s hand flexes on my neck, an iron grip, and holds me still.

“When’ll you be done?”

“We train for an hour, Lord.  But then I usually go—” _To my garden_ , I almost say.  But the Beast will not appreciate such a soft, womanly skill as gardening, despite the comforts it has provided him.  The man who let me bathe him and whose feet I bound, who told me what happened to the Purifier and held me while I grieved, who watched me dress and kissed me with such strange tenderness and passion, might.  But the Beast will not.

“Come back here when you’re done,” he says.  “I want you with me.”

He releases me and strides forward, through the rows of legionnaires, leaving me staring in surprise at his back.

He wants me with him.  The Beast wants me with him.

Pensive and puzzled, I make my way through the Great Hall to the shadowed doors of the Concubines’ training room. 


	9. Chapter 9

A day of shocks and surprises.  Another awaits me at the training room doors.  Usually only Gennica, Iloru, Aimi and Scalp-Taker’s two concubines train with me.  With Gennica, Iloru and Aimi dismissed from the Beast’s service, I expected to find only Kanike and Ferona awaiting me.

Instead two dozen women mill around the doors.  Spotting Aimi’s shaved head in the crowd, I catch her eye.  She approaches me hesitantly, her eyes flicking over my face.  I’m delighted to see her, doubly so for fearing I would not.  But she looks worried.  Have I strained our friendship so badly?

“Aimi,” I say warmly.

“Li, how are you?”

Does she see the confusion and turmoil the Beast has thrown me into?  Am I so transparent?  I’m usually better at hiding my emotions, although I cannot hope to match the Beast.

“I’m well.  How are you?”

“Fine, fine.  I’m sorry we couldn’t speak at the feast last night.”

I wave that away.  We have never let our friendship interfere with the performance of our duties.

“I wasn’t sure if I should come—” she says haltingly.

“No, no, of course you’re welcome—” I catch myself before I say _always_.  After tomorrow, this training will be another woman’s duty, and it would be presumptuous of me to speak for her.  “Here,” I finish, somewhat inadequately.

She smiles, looking relieved.

“Aimi, who are all these people?  Why are they here?”

She laughs, sparkling and light.  Taking my arm, she begins steering me through the crowd, which parts easily before us.  “There’s a rumor that the new Lord Marshal will pick three new Concubines today, since he’s dismissed the old ones.”

“But that’s not—” I stop myself.  He may well pick more than one Concubine to replace me.  I should not presume to speak for him, either.  “That doesn’t explain why all these women are here.”

“Doesn’t it?  Oh, Li, if I hadn’t guessed from looking at you, that alone would tell me the tale of what happened last night.”

“What does that mean?”  I nudge her with my elbow.  She has always teased me about my innocence.  In all our time together, she has never told me about her past.  It is not a fit subject even among friends.  But I guessed long ago that she knows much more about the ways of men and women than I do.

“It means you’re still a virgin, despite spending the night with our new Lord Marshal.  I was worried about you when you left the feast.  He looked like he was torn between eating you and snapping your neck.”

I bow my head, remembering his rebuke.  “He was not pleased with my singing,” I whisper.

Aimi laughs again as I open the doors and we walk through into the training room.  It will be a squeeze to fit over twenty women into this small chamber.  Since the days of Baylock, there have only been a handful of Concubines to train.

“Toal and I were,” she says, lowering her voice so that it does not carry in the high-ceilinged room.  “Vaako got what was coming to him.  So did Dame Vaako from the look of it.  Have you seen her this morning?”

“No.”

“She’s here.  On the prowl, no doubt.  But she’s sporting much darker eyes than usual.”

“He hit her?” I whisper, shocked.  There are those who say the Collar is cruel.  But nothing could be crueler than the strength of a man, a trained warrior like Vaako, turned against his companion.  It is incomprehensible to me, that sort of cruelty.  No man has ever raised his hand to me in anger.  My father, a ruthless Daixian hunter out of our lodge, was so indulgent inside it that I can’t remember him ever raising his voice at any of us.  Not even when Danton and I broke his favorite spear quarrelling over which of us should get to clean it.  Nor have any of my masters needed to beat me.  I am a good Servant.  True to my bond.  True to my station.  Even the Beast would never willingly hurt me . . .

I shake myself.  I don’t know that, and it would be the height of foolishness to put it to the test.

But somewhere deep, where the knowledge of him has begun to reside in me, I do know he wouldn’t hurt me.  He doesn’t even punish me with the Collar.  Not intentionally, not purposefully.  He asked how it could be taken off . . .

“Don’t feel too sorry for her,” Aimi says, pulling me out of my reverie.  “I think she enjoys it.”  We reach the low dais at the rear of the training hall and Aimi begins to slip her arm out of mine.  “Li, when we’re finished here, I have something to ask you.”

I almost say that I must hurry back to the Beast, but then I smile.  I can spare a moment for Aimi.  “Of course, whatever it is you wish.”  Her eyes sparkle, reminding me of her earlier teasing, and my inexperience.  I have a new and unfamiliar duty to do tonight.  Perhaps Aimi can coach me in how to perform it.  “I have something to ask you as well.”

While she moves into her place, I step up on the dais and signal to a Servant of the Hall, who guides a hover table laden with sparring equipment to my side.

“Welcome everyone,” I say.  Scanning the crowd, I see familiar faces – Aimi, Kanike and Ferona – who all smile back at me.  There are other courtiers I recognize – Helki, Ciara and Devaki – recent converts from the conquest of Aquilia and unattached to any officer.  The rest in the sea of faces are unfamiliar, and in their plain training uniforms, there is no rank or insignia to tell me who they are.  Who are all these women, and why are they truly here?

Three shapes standing near the back of the room stand out from the rest.  Dame Vaako, standing in the middle, her face averted as she whispers to the woman beside her, is immediately recognizable from her slinky attire.

I feel my smile turn feral.

“Dame Vaako,” I begin.  Her head snaps up, and as Aimi said, she does, indeed, sport a pair of very black eyes.  She is so artfully made up, it could just be a new fashion.  But all who attended the feast last night will know the truth.  How that must gall her.  “It is a great pleasure to have you join us today.”

She inclines her head to me, as if this is no more than her due.

I open my mouth, then hesitate.  The Beast would not be pleased with what I plan to say.  So I discard the slap I was going to deliver about her inappropriate attire and say instead, “Unfortunately, this training is only open to those who are, once were or hope to be concubines.  Our methods and weapons must remain a secret.  For the safety of the lords we protect.”

Her reddened eyes flare to coals.  I can almost hear her hiss to herself.  But I have left her no opening.  Nothing is more important than the safety of the Lord Marshal, and she knows it.

“Very well,” she says, giving me a curtsey that leaves me in no doubt that this battle has been joined and she will be back with a return salvo.  Trailing her two cronies, she sweeps out.

I lean over to the Servant who lingers near the hovering table.  “Lock the door behind you, Nazya.”

“Yes, Lady.”

When Nazya has left, I address the group again.  “All of you are familiar with gun and blade from your weapons training during Education.  These weapons are useful to the concubine as well.  But it is rarely desirable to wear a gun or a blade in the courthall or bedroom.  Yet a concubine must protect her lord at all times.  So a concubine’s greatest weapon is the one that is always with her.  Which cannot be stripped from her.  Her body.  Her mind.  We will train today with a concubine’s other weapons.  The Nightshade Dart.  The Deathshead Pin.”  I hold them up so the gathered women can see.  “But first we will train our minds and bodies to the task.  Find a place where you can kneel on the floor.  We’ll begin with five minutes of meditation, to clear our minds and center ourselves.  And then some stretches, to limber our bodies . . .”

 

I expect the women to file out silently at the end of the hour.  Instead, sweaty and smiling, they flock to the dais.  Each of them wants to speak with me.  To thank me for letting them stay.  To ask a question about the new Lord Marshal.  A few, one of them, shockingly, Ferona, who has been a concubine longer than I have, to ask if I could train them to serve at table.  The Beast has started a new fashion, it seems.

Feeling dazed by the sudden attention, I answer their questions one by one, and finally, stand alone on the dais as the last girl thanks me and makes her way to the door.

Aimi looks up from where she has been leaning patiently against the edge of the dais.

“Aimi—”

“It’ll only take a moment, Li.  I know you must be running late now.”

I smile at my friend.  She knows me, and how tightly I structure my day, too well.  “I was going to say, thank you for waiting.”

Aimi laughs.  “No, you weren’t.  But come on, I’ll walk with you wherever you’re going.”

“The main training hall.”

She links her arm through mine as we leave the small hall and I seal it behind us.  Ordinarily, I would leave the chamber open so that the Servants could clean it.  But Dame Vaako’s sudden interest has made me wary.  Cleaning can wait another day.

“So,” Aimi says, with a bright smile I have never seen her wear before.  “Can you guess?”

I bump her with my elbow.  “I can guess you went to Toal.”

She leans into me until she can put her head on my shoulder as we walk together.  “I did,” she says, her voice soft and so sweet it should be sickly.  But her happiness is sincere, and it is not.  “Oh, Li, he’s the most magnificent lover—”

“Aimi!”

“Well, he is.  You’re a virgin.  You can’t understand what it is to go from a healthy pairing to—”  She shudders.

“Lord Zhylaw honored you—” I begin.

“Oh, don’t.  I don’t want to argue with you today.  Be happy for me.”

“I am, Aimi.  Never doubt it.”

“Share it with me?  Stand as my second?  Toal’s asked me to be his companion.”

I squeeze her arm.  “Aimi, that’s wonderful.  But tomorrow is the third day of Mourning and I—”

Aimi’s head snaps up off my shoulder.  “You’re not still planning to take the Knife, are you?”

“Of course.”

She takes my upper arm with both hands and stops me, tugging me around to face her.  “You are, aren’t you?”

“I said I—”

She shakes me.  “Why don’t you ever listen to anyone?  Zhylaw didn’t love you.  He didn’t love anyone or anything.  Dying for him is the most foolish thing I can imagine—”

“Aimi!”

“No!”  She shakes me again.  “You listen to me this time.  Riddick is the new Lord Marshal.  And if you weren’t so blind, you would see the way he looks at you.  He _wants_ you, Li.  He wants you the way a man should want a woman.  Not the way that Half Dead _thing_ coveted you—”

“Aimi!” I hiss, pushing at her so she stops shaking me, scandalized that she would think, much less speak, so badly of the Lord we both served for so many years.  “Stop!”

“Listen to me!  You are blind, deaf and dumb if you think that Lord Riddick is going to let you go.  _He’s_ our Lord Marshal now, Li.  Mine and _yours_.”

“No, he’s—” _Not true_ , I almost say.  But I cannot betray myself, not even with Aimi, whom I trust more than anyone in the Basilica.

“He’s what?  What’s going on in your head, Li?  What are you thinking of doing?”

“Nothing!”  I say, shocked that she would think I harbor a single traitorous thought.  “I will serve him faithfully until the end of the days of Mourning.  But he is not the Master of the Collar.  He is not Purified.  He has not claimed me.  Tomorrow night I will take the Knife and follow my Lord Zhylaw as is my duty—”

“Li!”

“—and in keeping with our traditions,” I continue, speaking over her objection.

“Our traditions?!  Was it tradition that forced Baylock’s First to the Knife?  Or was it the hand of the Purifier?  You know Odyon wouldn’t have taken the Knife if it had been her choice.  You’ve read the histories!”

I shake my head.  “She was conflicted, that’s true, but—”

“She was _murdered_ , Li.  Killed before her Due Time.  Damalis, why are you so blind sometimes?!  There is no tradition.  There’s nothing but the blood of unwilling women—”

“Aimi—” I begin warningly.  She’s my friend, but even friendship has limits.

“All right.  All right.  I don’t want to argue with you.  I’ll ask Toal if we can have the union ceremony tomorrow.  If he and the Lord Marshal agree, will you stand as my second?”

“Of course.  Aimi, it’s not that I don’t want to—”

“I know,” she says, and there’s a certain bitterness to her tone that I don’t understand.  “You’re just doing what you see as your duty.  You always have, no matter how much it hurt you.  And I – I just don’t know how to convince you that you’re wrong.”

I tuck her arm through mine again and pull her along toward the main training hall.  “Then stop trying and we can stop arguing.  You have more important things to think about.  What are you going to wear?”

Aimi chuckles throatily.  “Toal says just my skin.”

I laugh with her, imagining the scandal, and the spectacle.  Aimi is not as beautiful as Gennica, but she is very shapely.  Half the men of the Armada would fight Toal for her if she appeared in only her skin.  “If you want anything from my wardrobe,” I offer.  “It is yours.  The Weavers can alter it for you.”

“Would you mind, Li?  I didn’t want to ask, but—”

“Who is the foolish one?  Anything I have is yours.”

She squeezes my arm.  “You’re generous to a fault . . . oh, Li, what am I going to do without you?”

“Without me?”  I ask lightly, trying to divert her.  This is her special time.  She should be enjoying each moment of it, not dwelling on something that upsets her.  “Lord Riddick has ordered us to the Threshold.  How long will you be without me?  If I delay much longer, you’ll reach the Threshold before I do.”

“Don’t,” she says, shaking her shaven head.  “I can’t bear to think about it.  What were you going to ask me?”

I swallow hard, suddenly shy.  “It was nothing.  Will you and Toal exchange favors?  Rings?  Knives?”

“Rings, I suppose.  Don’t change the subject.  What did you want to know?”

I sigh.  I shouldn’t let this opportunity slip by.  Aimi is a knowledgeable and experienced woman.  And I am neither.  Not in the duty I need to perform tonight.

“The—” _Beast_ , I almost say before I catch myself.  I have to watch my words, even with Aimi.  “The new Lord Marshal has . . . he has indicated he will use me tonight.  And I . . . I don’t know how to serve him.”

“He has?”  Aimi grips my arm with excitement.  “That’s wonderful!”

Is it?  I don’t see how.  “Aimi, what am I supposed to do?”

“Mmm?  Anything he asks you to.”

I scramble to think of the commands he has given me.  There are few, and they are usually unreasonable.  It would be better if I could anticipate his needs.  “He almost never tells me how to serve him.”

“The silent type?  Toal is, too,” Aimi says, her tone commiserating.  “Look, Li, the first time is the worst.  You won’t know what he wants and he won’t know what you like.  And if I know you, you won’t tell him you’re a virgin.  But if you can relieve him, with your hands or with your mouth, before he enters you, the first time won’t be so bad.  You know how to do that, don’t you?”

“No,” I admit miserably.

“You don’t?  All those times you were bathing the Lord Marshal, you never—?”

“Aimi, please.”

“Sorry.  I’m sorry, Li.  I just assumed . . . well, look, I can show you, but not in the middle of a corridor.”

Fascinated despite myself, I steer her into an alcove.  “Show me.” 


	10. Chapter 10

I am very late to join the Beast.  But the delay has been worthwhile.  I have some hope that I will not disgrace my station tonight, although it seems to me that I could use a very great deal of practice before I attempt any of the things Aimi has shown me.  Perhaps later, while the Beast meets with his commanders, I might have a little time alone . . . if he even chooses to follow that much of the Lord Marshal’s daily protocol.

If he does, I might also have time to review the instructions in the Concubines’ histories.  Instructions on how to please the Lord Marshal in _that_ way, which I have never read because there was no need . . .

Aimi waves to me as she turns down the corridor towards the quarters she now shares with Toal.  I smile back, genuinely happy for her.

The Elites guarding the doors to the training hall snap to attention when I walk towards them.  They open the doors smartly, and close them behind me with the same alacrity.

And the lights go out.

In blackness, punctuated by the breathing of five hundred men and the faint shuffling of nervous feet, I hear the Beast’s voice.

“Darkness,” he says, a resonant bass whisper.  It ruffles caressingly over my skin, raising goose bumps.  “Man’s most primal fear.”

I am not afraid of the dark.  Any fear was trained out of me young, by my mother who took me and my two sisters hunting at night until we overcame our instinctive trepidation.  My Feleti masters encouraged my comfort with the dark, so that I could attend to their needs in the night without waking the whole house.  And I am so used to moving around the sanctum in the dark that when I’m alone there, I rarely bother to turn on the lights.

And so, unafraid, I begin to walk, slowly and cautiously, down the central aisle, towards the sound of the Beast’s voice.

“Use it against your enemy,” says the Beast.  “Make the dark your weapon.  Lose your fear.”

His words, the timbre of his voice, pull me down the aisle towards him like a tether.  Although I cannot see the stone under my feet, or the ranks of men standing silent around me, I never falter.

“Rely on your eyes and they’ll let you down.”  An edge of bitterness creeps into his voice.  Have his eyes betrayed him?  I thought those silver eyes missed nothing.  “Use your other senses.  What d’you smell?  What d’you hear?”

I approach the dais on which he stands.

His voice rolls over me, black-furred and touchable.  “Feel anything?  The brush of someone sliding by you in the dark?  Hear anythin’?  A breath?  A footfall?”

If the soldiers can feel or hear me, they give no sign.  My seeking toes find the first step up to the dais.  I climb the curving stairs and stop on the top step.  It would not be proper for me to mount the dais without the Beast’s permission.

“Liaden,” he says, very softly, from just a hand’s breadth away.  I did not hear him approach.

“Lord,” I whisper.

His warm hand closes on mine.  Can he see me?  Even with my long familiarity with both the dark and this room, I would not have been able to find his hand in the blackness.  Is that the power of those silver eyes?  Can he see even in the pitch blackness?

He pulls me up the final step to stand beside him.

“You up for a little sparring?” he asks in a whisper, his mouth brushing my ear.

“Yes, Lord.”

“Good.”

His fingers slide around my neck, under the edge of my tunic, shooting warmth across my skin.  He turns me so that I stand in front of him.  His heat rises behind me, warmer than a blazing fire.  Hands settle on my neck, under my braid, fingers brushing my Collar.  It pulses like a living thing.

“Lights to twenty percent,” he says.

The Collar beats against my bone, the way it does when I use the link to the Basilica.  But I have done nothing.  It is the Beast’s command the Collar responds to, even though that’s impossible.

The lights rise to a soft glow.

Confounded by the light and his use of my Collar, I blink.

The ranks below, their perfect order gone ragged in the dark, look equally confounded.

“Any of you feel her walk by?”  He leans into my back, his hands flexing.  His cheek brushes my neck, the lightest of feather touches.  “Hear her?”  He takes a deep breath, sliding his head around mine.  “Smell her?”

The soldiers on the floor, many of them Elites who should be trained well enough not to lose their composure in the dark, glance at each other and shuffle their feet.  But no one raises their hand or makes any other outward sign.

“She coulda killed any of you.  Never underestimate your opponent.  Or your own fear.”  In an undertone, he adds, “Get ready.”

I give him the barest of nods and center myself so that I am ready for whatever he does.

His hands release me, and I hear the slide of metal on leather.

Bending my knees to drop my center of gravity, I spin away from him.  He has drawn a knife, a wicked blade that recurves along his forearm.  The edge glints as he swings it in a downward arc toward my head.

This is no blunt training weapon.  It is a real blade and he swings it with real strength, expecting me to parry or dodge the blow.  Parrying would be foolish.  I cannot match his strength, even for one blow.  But I am smaller, and I move very fast.

Using the momentum from my spin, I dive forward onto my hands.  I throw myself into a handspring and flip away from the descending blade.  When I bounce to my feet, I yank the Pins from their holders in my shoulder seams and settle into a crouch, facing him, Pins at the ready.

The Beast checks his swing effortlessly.  He nods at me.

“ _Never_ underestimate your opponent,” he booms, turning his head toward the legions.  “She’s smaller.  Weaker.  Should be an easy kill.  But did any of you see those weapons?  She was standin’ right in front of you.”

A faint muttering passes through the ranks, and I sense that the Beast has just delivered two lessons.  One stated, and the other implied: the woman who sits at his right hand is ever armed.

The Beast whirls, the scrape of his heel as he pivots giving me warning just before his blade slashes at me again.  He slices across this time, straight at my neck, giving me no space to leap away.

But he is a tall man, and I am a woman of no more than average size.  He swings high and I duck under the swing, my arm darting in and ramming a Pin into his Dyneemal tunic.  I thrust at the wrong angle, down towards his stomach, deliberately, so that if the Weavers’ skill fails, the Pin will not wound him deeply.  Even having it puncture his skin could be dangerous, given the Pin’s powers, but I’m close enough that I could yank it out in time.

I whirl away, into another defensive crouch, holding my remaining Pin.

The Beast straightens.  He turns so that the legionnaires can see the carved, burnished head of the Pin protruding from his tunic like a quivering thumb.

“Quick.  Agile,” he says, low and carrying.  “If this’d been a blade, she might have gotten in a gut wound.”  His silver eyes slide to me, glinting.  “Liaden’s specialty.”

Thinking of the deference I gave to Dame Vaako, when I would have liked nothing more than to have given her the comeuppance she so richly deserves, I smile coldly at him.

Quicksilver amusement moves behind his eyes.  He sheathes his blade behind his back and pulls out the Pin.  Holding it in his open palm, he offers it to me.

I check to make sure there’s no blood on the Pin before plucking it from his hand.  Once the Pin tastes blood, it is harder to control.  But there is no blood.  The stern face carved into the head of the Pin has not split into its soul-sucking howl.  The Weavers have done their work well.

When I look up, he’s bowing to me slightly.  I return his bow, then slide the Pins back into their places.  When he holds out a hand to me, I move to stand at his side.

“You’ve come to depend too much on your armor,” the Beast says, looking sternly over the assembled ranks.  “Tomorrow, report without it.”

“Yes, Lord Marshal.”  Each legionnaire shouts, their collective voice shaking the hall.

“Dismissed,” the Beast says, with such quiet authority that I can’t help but wonder if he’s done this before.  But how could a convict have commanded legions?

The legionnaires salute and pivot smartly, row by row, until they all face the back of the training hall.  Then they file out.  In perfect silence.  The only noise in the hall is the tramp of their heavy footsteps.  I cannot help but mark the contrast to the end of my training with the end of his.

The Beast’s hand curves around my waist and pulls me closer.  He drops his head to breathe warmly in my ear.  Mindful of the sensors that are, doubtless, still trained on the dais and beaming my every move to each ship in the Armada, I control a shiver.

“Thank you, Liaden.”

“You’re most welcome, Lord.  That was . . . impressive.”

He chuckles.  “You said they’d like a spectacle.”

I did say that.  But I didn’t realize he would listen so closely to me.  My Lord Zhylaw never did.

“I think you’ve given them one.  They will talk of this training for many days to come.”

“That was the idea.  Now, any chance of breakfast?”

Despite the many eyes on me, I have to laugh.  “Of course.”

 

I have Chef serve breakfast in my garden.  A place I never would have invited Lord Zhylaw.  It would not have been proper.  And, occupied with the weighty matters of the Campaign, he would not have come.  But the Beast is a different sort of man.  The sort who appreciates fleshy comforts like fine tea and the good scents of resinous soap and freshly turned soil.  There is much, I think, that will appeal to him in my garden.

He squints when we first enter and I hastily dim the bright, artificial light.  The farinch flock that roosts in the rowela trees launches into their evening song.  To their twittering, I guide the Beast toward the bower in the center of my garden, where his breakfast awaits.

Chef has outdone himself, I see, when we reach the bower.  A heavily-laden table, stacked with crystal bowls of fruit, towering serveries of meat, and baskets of plain and sweet breads, hovers next to an ornate metal bench in the middle of my rose bower.  Veer, my chief gardener, has also made his presence felt.  Black Caprune roses, freshly cut and glittering in their darkly iridescent glory, nod from metal vases on each corner of the table.  Veer has even garnished the plates with edible Orchidos, their deep plum petals spattering the edges of the Lord Marshal’s burnished service like ink.  And in a pointed gesture so typical of Veer, he has laid my gardening gloves, a bundle of magnetic ties, and a pair of plasma sheers on the edge of the richly laid table.

I laugh.

“What?” the Beast asks, his tone indulgent.

“My gardener reminds me that I am remiss in my duty to my garden.  I should have tied up the roses days ago.  Would you forgive me if I tend to the roses while you eat?  Or would you prefer that I feed you?”

“Think I can manage it by myself,” the Beast grunts.  He settles onto the padded bench while I don my gardening gloves and begin working on the bed of roses nearby.

“This ain’t on the ship’s schematic,” the Beast says after he has finished two of Chef’s excellent spiced eggs.  I can smell them, even over the scent of the roses, and the smell makes my stomach cramp.  I’m glad when he finishes them.

“No,” I agree.  “It appears as storage.”  I cut a spray of Calimbree roses, small and dully colored, but highly scented in the way of all flora from that planet.  I place them on the table next to him so that he can enjoy their scent.

He sniffs appreciatively before selecting several links of roasted meat for his plate.  “Why?”

I move away from the table and turn my attention back to the roses so that I do not have to smell the sausages, one of my favorite dishes.  “A long story.”

He stabs a link with his pronged fork and examines it before biting down on one end.  The sight of his strong, white teeth sinking into the sausage distracts me so much from my pruning that I nearly slice off a finger with the plasma sheers.

“I got time,” he says, taking another bite of sausage.

I fumble, expecting him to be uninterested and easily deflected.  “Beriszl built these gardens.  She was third concubine to Lord Marshal Kryll.  A most unhappy woman.  She lost nine children in the conquest of Wafa.  Purification did not take the pain of that loss away as it should have.  Even after Kryll did her the honor of claiming her as his concubine, she was prone to terrible fits of melancholy.  Her Lord kindly gave her this place to create a garden.  And he hid it so that no one would disturb her.”

The Beast slants his eyes towards the hill that rises over us, in the center of the garden, on whose flanks flower and herb beds create nine interlinked circles.  “Graves?”

“Memorials,” I say.  They had been abandoned, left to run wild, by previous concubines when I inherited the garden.  But Veer, who is old enough to remember not only Beriszl but Danior, told me of them.  It has taken us several years to recreate them, and I am pleased to have done so in Beriszl’s honor.

The Beast shakes his head.  “Anythin’ you do _not_ bound up in tradition, Liaden?”

“No, Lord,” I say stiffly.

He grunts and I return to my pruning.

“Lookin’ at the Armada schematics this morning,” he says after a few moments.  “Some things I couldn’t find.”

Doubtless he wasn’t looking in the right places.  My Lord Zhylaw’s records were very thorough.  “I’ll help you find them, if I can.  What were you looking for?”

“Tallies,” he says, around a mouthful of sausage.  “Ships.  Men.  How big’s the Armada?”

“It varies.  With each conquest we lose some ships and some of the Legion Vast.  But there are always more converts to replenish the ranks.  And the Builders work hard to replace any ships we’ve lost.  I do not know exactly how many were lost on Helion—”

“Best guess, Liaden,” he interrupts, sounding amused.

I try to remember what my Lord Zhylaw told me about the plan of attack for Helion.  He usually ruminated on a coming conquest in his bath for several days before launching the attack.  “There were two hundred and eleven ships in the Armada when we attacked Helion.  Not counting the small fighter craft.  The _Sadaki_ and the men on her were lost during the first wave.  Scales lost the _Zuela_ a few days later during an attack on the equatorial redoubts.”

I know that because my Lord Zhylaw raged about it for an hour after the report came back that Scales had led a direct assault against a well-fortified resistance stronghold.  A stronghold Zhylaw had ordered him to save for last.

“So that’s two hundred and nine,” the Beast says, his voice still rich with that wry amusement he can convey with so little inflection.

“Yes, Lord.  But the _Sadaki_ and the _Zuela_ were two of the dreadnoughts.  There are only twenty of those.”  Zhylaw was extremely displeased to lose _two_ of them in the conquest of a system that was not known for its martial prowess.  “There were a number of smaller craft, frigates and the like, which were lost.  And perhaps fifty thousand men.  I doubt the final tally has been made. It usually takes weeks after a conquest.”

“Fifty thou—” the Beast trails off, shaking his head.  “How many were there before the attack?”

“Over three million legionnaires.  Perhaps half as many technicians.  Five thousand pilots or so,” I say absently, contemplating a wayward spray of rose buds.  Too many on one stem, I decide, clipping selectively.  “And the Basilica houses ten thousand.  Mostly commanders, officers and advisors to the Lord Marshal.  And, of course, his Servants.”

“Three million,” the Beast whispers, perhaps the softest sound I have heard from him yet.

Do the numbers of the Legion Vast surprise him?  I have grown so used to them, they no longer affect me.  “Yes, Lord.”

The Beast is silent except for the clink of cutlery against his plate.  I let him eat while I shore up my roses.  The Caprune whites are by far the most beautiful flowers I have ever seen.  Each petal glimmers like a pearl.  The central circle of stamens and pistels are blood red.  Aimi’s favorite flowers.  I’ll have to remember to ask Veer to cut several bouquets for her union ceremony.  But the Caprunes are so overbred that their thin stems can barely support the huge flowers as buds, much less once they bloom.  And they are so delicate that they cannot be tied with mechanical ties, which bruise their stems and cause them to wither.  Each stem requires a tricky magnetic tie.  Their poisonous thorns make the close work perilous, too difficult for Veer’s gnarled old hands.

I am so focused on my task that I almost miss hearing the Beast say, half to himself, “Three million.  That’ll keep the mercs off my neck for a while.”

I finish the last tie and turn to him.  “What was that, Lord?”

He’s watching me, silver eyes inscrutable.  “Nothin’.”

The plates in front of him are empty.  “Are you finished?”  I rise, stripping off my gloves, and steer the table away from him.

“Yeah,” he says.  “C’mere, Liaden.”

The small hairs on the back of my neck rise.  There is danger here.  Not from the garden.  I know it better than I know my own skin.  The smallest disturbance here would prick me sharper than any Caprune thorn.

The danger is from the Beast.  Something in the way he watches me.  The shift of his expression from satiation to expectation.  He’s planning something.  I have to distract him, because whatever it is he plans, it will be another assault on everything I know and trust.  And my hold on what is true and right is too tenebrous now, with the many shocks I have suffered since my Lord Marshal’s fall, to withstand another of his assaults.

I hold my hand out to him.  “Can I show you my garden, Lord?”  Perhaps that will distract him.  Perhaps a visit to the stinging Cynara nettles that I use in the tea he likes.  An accidental stumble into the nettles will distract him from anything else for a very long time.

He stretches with catlike fluidity, a gesture that reminds me strongly of another garden resident.  I wonder if he and Tihamner might like each other.  They share a number of traits.  Then my conjectures are cut short when he rises and takes my hand.

Linking my arm through his, I lead him through the low mist from the morning's watering, past metal trellises adorned with flying cranes and festooned with climbers, to the rowela grove.  He should at least sample some of my garden’s delights before discovering its thorns.

Amongst the fragrant trees, I pick a ripe rowela fruit for him and break it open.  He sniffs at the citrus fragrance and opens his mouth for a blood-red wedge.

 “If you spit the pips out, one of the farinches might come down for them,” I say, holding out my hand.

The Beast spits the seeds into his own palm and, after a glance at me, holds it out.

Two farinches, their black and gold plumage flashing in the low light, dive down from the trees to snatch the pips out of the Beast’s hand.  The Beast follows their darting flight with his eyes and gives me a faint smile.

“There are other birds and small animals in the garden,” I say.  Veer and I value them, as well as the voracious green spiders that arrived on a batch of flowers from Jeranda, for keeping pests at bay.  “But there is someone else you might enjoy meeting more.”

At his nod, I lead him to the low-lying bogs at the foot of the central hillock.  The nettles prefer to have their feet wet.  And the mud provides Tihamner with his favorite lay.

A soft growl as we near the nettles tells me that Tihamner is in his usual spot.  I kneel and hold out my hands.

A long, aquiline nose parts the nettles.  Tihamner’s eyes shine for a second amongst the shadowy foliage.  Then he surges out of his lay, neck and back scales ruffling at the sight of a stranger.  His chameleon hide flushes from glossy green to red as he stalks towards me.  He sniffs my hands once, and butts his jaw against my palm in greeting.  Then he raises his head towards the Beast and growls so loudly that his neck scales rattle.

The Beast does not back away into the nettles.  He does not even seem intimidated by the huge, scaled predator growling at him.

“A hellhound,” he says.

“A poor name,” I answer.  “For such a noble animal.  This is Tihamner.  He and his mate are the guardians of my garden.”

Evolved in the underground warrens of Cantara, the two lupinarus are ideal guardians.  They do not suffer from the claustrophobia that would affect a predator adapted to open spaces.  They are long-lived, need little attention, and are happy to subsist on a diet of grubs and tubers, with the occasional supplement of live animals that Veer and I provide from conquered worlds.

The Beast leans forward slowly, until he stares directly into Tihamner’s glowing eyes.  And I finally realize what the Beast’s eyes remind me of.  And why I have never been truly afraid of him.

Tihamner recognizes a kindred spirit.  His hide fades back to a neutral gray-brown.  When the Beast holds out his hands, Tihamner pushes his face into them.

“Whore,” I say affectionately to the lupinarus.

Tihamner, who understands a great deal more than any but I give him credit for, turns his head and snaps at me.  But there is a smile writ large on his long muzzle.  Then he buries his face back in the Beast’s stroking hands.

“Natane would have greeted you, too,” I say.  “But she is denning.  She has a new cub and they haven’t emerged yet.”

The Beast nods as he scratches the scales around and under Tihamner’s ears.  “Where’ll the cub go?”

“When it weans?  To one of the lensor teams.  All of Tihamner and Natane’s cubs have gone to the sweep teams.”

“I want the cub,” the Beast says shortly.  “It’ll make a good guard.”

I stare at him, open-mouthed.  Lord Zhylaw would never have allowed an animal in his sanctum.  He didn’t even like having the two lupinarus aboard the Basilica, although he recognized their usefulness.

But the Beast is right.  A lupinarus would make an ideal guard.  And he is a Beast, so naturally he will not object to having another animal in his chamber.

“Of-of course, Lord.”

The Beast gives Tihamner’s neck a final, rough pat.  Tihamner growls appreciatively, and then, seeming to know that his time is up, slinks back towards his muddy lay.

“Come on, Liaden.”  The Beast holds his hand out to me and when I take it, leads me unerringly back to the bower, even though we have not taken a direct path from it to the nettle patch.  When we reach the bower, he sits down on the bench and pats the seat beside him.  “Siddown.”

That instinct of danger returns and I twist my hands together, trying to think of another diversion.  “Would you like some tea, Lord?”

“Nope.  I want dessert.  Siddown.”

Insanely relieved, I turn to the hover table to find him something sweet.  Then I realize he’s not talking about food.

“Liaden—” he growls, a warning as threatening as Tihamner’s.  And, in its own way, as familiar.

Kindness and composure won over Tihamner and Natane, so feral after being ignored for years by my predecessors that none but Veer could even approach them.  Perhaps the same care will pacify the Beast.

I sit carefully next to him, wishing I had on one of my gowns so that I could busy myself with arranging my skirts.  I settle for smoothing my short tunic.  When I am as composed as I can make myself, I look up at him and manage a smile.

His silver eyes slip over my face.  They should be comforting, familiar to me, given how similar they are to the lupinarus’s eyes.  But Tihamner and Natane never look at me with such avid intent.  It makes me squirm before I can control myself.

“Damn, you’re skittish,” the Beast says.

“Forgive me—”

He reaches out, forestalling my apology.  His hand slides around my neck in a gesture that’s becoming so familiar it shouldn’t bother me anymore.  And it wouldn’t if he weren’t staring at me with those hooded, _hungry_ eyes.

He pulls me toward him.  Warmth circles my waist, his other arm wrapping around me and sliding me across the bench until my thigh presses against his.  His fingers walk the hem of my tunic up until he finds skin.  Once he has achieved his objective, his hand spreads in a torrid flare across the small of my back.  His thumb rubs over the base of the Collar and wildfire dances along my spine.

I’m not so innocent that I don’t know what’s coming.  I’ve closed my eyes in anticipation of it.  But his mouth doesn’t descend.  So I open my eyes and find those demanding quicksilver eyes looking right into mine.

“I—”

He smiles, and then his mouth comes down.  He kisses me the way he kissed me in my chamber.  A brush of moist skin.  A sensuous glide of lips across mine.  A firmer pressure against the side of my mouth that makes me turn my head to follow him, reaching up to hold him still.  He chuckles, deep in his throat, a vibration I can feel on his lips.  His light touch leaves me wanting.

His teeth graze my lip, another sensation I am prepared for.  But nothing prepares me for the effect of his small motions on my senses.  I am swamped.  By his heat, behind and in front and all around me.  By the touch of his hands on my skin, his fingers kneading, caressing, gliding more easily as my skin moistens with sweat.  By his mouth, moving over and against and now into mine.  He touches his tongue to my tongue, a heady brush, followed by the same brief withdrawal.

That motion, of thrust and withdrawal, stirs me on a primitive level.  I am not so innocent that I am ignorant of what it simulates.  But it should mean nothing to me.  A duty, no more.  Why, then, this spiraling heat in my belly?  This wetness between my thighs that I remember from when I used to pleasure myself on Tarenge, so many years ago?  Why am I pressing closer to him, wanting more contact?  Wanting that intense remembered sensation?

The pleasures of the flesh.  I should be beyond them.  I respected Zhylaw for nothing so much as his evolved aestheticism.  The Beast offers only a return to what I left behind years ago.  To what I should be beyond, particularly now as I prepare to follow my Lord to the Threshold.

But I’m not.  I want these sensations so much I shake with it.  So much my hands ball to fists on his neck.  I press my mouth to his.  He chuckles again, but holds me in check, pinning me with his hands and giving me nothing more than achingly soft kisses.  Small touches of his tongue.  Light scrapes of his teeth.

He lifts his head from mine without warning, cool air rushing across my flushed cheeks and chin.  I strain upward to catch his mouth again.  He lets me, then he presses his lips to mine hard, bruisingly, his mouth moving on mine as though he would eat me, and for one moment I feel afraid, that he should hold his true strength so ruthlessly in check.  What will happen to me when he unleashes it?  Then he shifts away, and looks down at me, that mercuric amusement rising into his eyes.

“You make it hard to wait, Liaden,” he murmurs.

I wither from his sarcasm.  My hands drop from his neck.  He toys with me.  I am not beautiful.  I do not arouse him.  I displease him constantly.  He does this to amuse himself and torment me for reasons I cannot begin to fathom.

His hand catches my jaw and tilts my face up to his.  His eyes move over my face, considering, evaluating.

“Stormy,” he says.  “Thought they were black, but they’re not.”

My eyes.  Very dark gray, like my mother’s.

“Liaden.  The gray one,” I say, reaching for composure, and any distraction I can think of.

A low noise.  “That how you think of yourself?”

I try not to think of myself at all.

“A concubine’s duty is to think constantly of her lord, his needs and his comfort.  Thinking of myself is a dereliction of that duty.”

The Beast’s mouth, soft and reddened from that final kiss, tightens.  “Not much of a life, Liaden.”  He releases my chin and stands, turning away from me.  “Said I’d meet the junior officers this morning.”

I stand hastily, brushing off my tunic.  “Of course.  I’ll show you to the command chamber.”

Without warning, moving faster than he did at any time when we were sparring, he turns back to me and wraps his hand around my throat.  With his thumb, he pushes my head up until he can stare directly into my eyes.  “Anythin’ more important than your duty, Liaden?”

He tests me?  “Of course not, Lord.  I am a faithful servant.”

“No.  Guess not,” he says, and I can tell from the creeping anger in his tone that, somehow, I have said the wrong thing.  Somehow displeased him again.  “Would you die for me, Liaden?”

“Yes, Lord,” I say, without hesitation, trying in any small way to rectify the mistake I have, unwittingly, made.  “And I would kill to protect you.”

He releases me, turns and holds out his elbow for me to take.  “Well, that’s somethin’.”

I guide him out of my garden, my mind flicking back and forth between the instructions I need to give Veer about the roses, and the Beast’s baffling words.

 

Returning to the quietude of the Lord Marshal’s chambers is a great relief after the tumult of the morning.  Tiguan informs me that Aimi has come and gone, taking with her three of my gowns.  Smiling at her indecision, I make my way to my wardrobe to see which ones she chose.  Three of the new black scalecloth that the courtiers favor.  She is welcome to them.  I wear the scalecloth in deference to court fashion, but I much prefer the gray lorganza that the Weavers make for me.  Like the Dyneemal, it is more armor than cloth.  Although the lorganza is not as strong as the Dyneemal, it is wonderfully silky on the skin.  I lay out one of my gray gowns, and after checking my lens to make sure no one requires me, I go to take the bath I have been denied for so long.

The Chamber of the Bath is silent and empty when I enter, as it should be.  It was a shock to find Gerjun and the other Servants here yesterday, when they are usually all but invisible as they go about their appointed tasks.  As I take off my robe and drape it carefully over a warming rack, I wonder if that is the way my Lord Zhylaw felt about me.  Was I all but invisible to him?

The Beast certainly seems to see me.  Although I am not sure _what_ he sees.  Am I a challenge to him?  An irritation?  I have tried to be useful to him, to help him however I could, as is my duty.  But his demands are so strange, so mysterious to me, that I have a strong sense of failure.

Acrid, it washes over me, like the taste of bile.  I will not fail.  Not in any small thing.  I will do my duty perfectly, so that he can find no fault with me.  I will show him what it means to be served by the First Concubine, a privilege and honor reserved to the Lord Marshal alone.  I will do my duty so well that any he selects to replace me will fall far, far short in his eyes . . .

I give myself a mental shake.  It is of no consequence to me who he selects to replace me, or how well she performs her duties.  It is enough that I perform them perfectly, so that I do not disgrace my station or my fallen Lord.

I veer from the path I was taking towards the low bath.  I usually prefer its coolness, to refresh myself after training and to chase away any lingering ruddiness from my skin.  Zhylaw preferred me very pale.  But the Beast’s preference for the warm bath makes me wonder.  Does it feel different, the warm water on his skin?  Is there a pleasure in it that I have been foregoing?

Lowering myself into the warm water, I find that there is a very great pleasure in it.  I sink back into the narrow oval of the bath, where the Beast lay when I bathed him.  My arms look so different from his, stretched along the bath’s rim.  I have a little muscle in my shoulders and arms from training and from my more strenuous duties, like lifting the Basilica Cup.  Certainly more muscle than the skeletal fashion of courtiers like Dame Vaako.  But my arms look like pipestems against the memory of the Beast’s huge shoulders and biceps.  He is a massive man, with massive strength.  I remember that strength unleashed for a brief moment when he kissed me in the garden, and I shiver.  He will not hurt me.  I know that to be true.  I’m beyond small pains, and he will not do me a large one.  There is nothing to fear.  And I will not be afraid . . . not of anything the Beast might do to me.

I stretch in the bath, trying to relax.  The warm water helps, lapping at me, a pleasant rippling over my skin.  My breasts bob in it, cool air feathering the tops into gooseflesh.  Will the Beast want to touch my breasts?  No man ever has.  I still had a child’s straight lines when I bid farewell to Hanuel.  He kissed me, held me, and promised that he would wait for me to serve out my bond.  A promise he kept, I believe, right to the day of his death.  Our farewell was so many years ago now that I cannot remember what his kisses felt like.  The only memory of a man’s mouth that I have is the Beast’s.

I run my hands experimentally over my breasts.  A soft thrill of sensation, skin on skin.  My nipples are more sensitive than I remembered.  Each sensation is more acute, as though time dulled them.  Strange that time has not dulled my anger at my Feleti masters, or the sharp grief I feel over the loss of my family, when I allow myself to dwell on what must be forgotten.

Pushing those unwanted thoughts away, thoughts I have not let myself entertain since I was Purified, and would not entertain now if it were not for the disruptive influence of the Beast, I climb out of the warm water and cross to the wall closet.  The door snicks open at the touch of my palm.

I survey the contents of the closet grimly.  Practice with something as thick as three or four fingers together, Aimi said.  While I do not doubt her word, surely she is mistaken.  When the Beast was in the bath, he was nowhere near that large.  But, dutifully, I select a long bottle with a rounded cap.  I take it back to the bath with me along with some creams and sponges.

Cleansing myself, with the warm water adding to the titillation of the silky dermal creams gliding over my skin, leaves me relaxed.  I take extra time with my hair, since the Beast seems to favor it, washing it from roots to tips, enriching it with a cream made fragrant with Calimbree rose oil from my garden, and twisting it up into a setting wrap that will leave it a straight, silken fall to my waist.  While I work, I banish all unwanted memories and focus on my duty.  The Beast will expect me to be professional, accomplished and competent when giving him pleasure.  He will not want a fumbling innocent.

And so when I finish with my hair, I pick up the bottle and hold it in front of me.  Smooth downwards, Aimi said, from the tip to the base, and then back up.  I make a ring of my fingers and thumb and push it down over the bottle’s cap.  My grip slips as the bottle widens.  Chagrined, I try again, glad now that I have taken the opportunity to practice.  The Beast would not have appreciated my jerky inexperience.

I quickly discover the uncomfortable friction of repeated rubbing and return to the closet for a tub of the slippery butter I used on the Beast’s feet.  I must remember to bring some to the sanctum tonight.  When I am confident of my stroke, and have practiced different tensions and rubbing the cap with my thumb as Aimi instructed, I sit in the bath and regard the bottle.  Aimi swore that taking the Beast in my mouth would bring him greater pleasure than anything I could do with my hands.  I want to do my duty, and do it well.  But the idea of swallowing anything but food – and the very thought of that makes my stomach cramp from hunger – is unappealing.

Eyeing the bottle distastefully, I decide to start with something else.  He’ll appreciate any part of his genitals in my mouth, Aimi promised, even his soft sac.  I make a fist, holding my first two knuckles extended from the rest of my hand.  They approximate the right shape, if not the right size.  I would need knuckles as large as his for that.  Leaning back in the bath, I take first one knuckle and then the other.  It is an uncomfortable stretch for my small mouth, so I rub a little more of the butter into my lips and try again.  It is much easier to gauge the effect of lips and teeth and tongue when I am practicing on my own skin.  So after a while I set the bottle aside and take three of my fingers into my mouth.  Perhaps Aimi is used to extremely large men.  I cannot believe the Beast will get much larger than my three fingers.

While I work my mouth over my fingers, a strange beat begins low in my belly.  The motions of my lips and tongue, the thrust and withdrawal of my fingers, stir me.  They remind me of those nights lying in my narrow bed in the Feleti complex, touching myself silently, so that I wouldn’t wake up any of the other servants with whom I shared the long dormitory.  Controlling even my breathing through climax so that my illicit actions went unsuspected.

There is no need for silence here.  And so when my free hand slides down my belly to rub the folds between my legs and my breathing echoes in the marble chamber, I do not try to control it.  I let my breathing accelerate naturally, in time with the quickening movements of my fingers.  Rubbing my middle finger over and over the soft, central nub makes it swell, ache, and finally, shoot pleasurable spasms up into my core.  It is gentle sensation, this climax, an in-drawing that seems unsatisfyingly incomplete.  It leaves me wanting, as the Beast’s kisses left me wanting, even though I know that climax should be an end in itself.  It is not, and I lie back in the tub, rinsing off my fingers in the water, and wondering what I’m missing. 


	11. Chapter 11

 

When the Beast returns, I am dressed, my hair intricately braided and bound with the Rift clasp, my skin paled to the color of milk.  I have checked and checked again in my mirror to ensure that no hint of the unsatisfied beat that still pulses between my legs can be seen.  The paler covers the betraying flush in my cheeks.  My breathing and heartbeat are as steady as I can make them.

The Beast prowls into the sanctum; his movements, in my peripheral vision, reminiscent of the lupinarus’s.  He watches me for a moment, while I finish arranging the ceremonial vestments on a display stand.  Then he moves a step closer, leans into me, and sniffs.

“You smell . . . interesting.  What’ve you been doing while I been gone, Liaden?”

A plastering of paler wouldn’t cover the heat that floods to my cheeks.  I duck my head to hide my flush.  “Bathing, Lord.”

“Mmm.”  He sets down a bundle he carries on the edge of his desk and leans against it, crossing his arms over his chest.  “What’s all that?”

“Your robes for the ceremony today.  The Weavers have worked very hard to get them ready—”

The Beast glances over the mailed coif, helmet, massive spaulders, bracers, gauntlets, cuirass, thigh cuisses, greaves and trailing scaled cloak sitting on the stand.  I put my hand on an ear flange of the finely decorated skullhelm, to draw his gaze to the Weavers’ workmanship.  His eyes glimmer, but not in any way that indicates approval.

“I’ll wear about half a that.”

“But—”

“Thought you were listenin’ to me, Liaden.  Speed.  Agility.  Counts for more than all this armor you Necros pile on.  I’m not gettin’ trapped in that tin can.”

I mash my teeth together to keep my response from bursting out between them.

“Somethin’ you want to say?” he asks, his eyes narrowing.

Many things.  All of which would set the Collar on fire.  “No, Lord.”

He snorts.  “Yeah.  You got that cheat-sheet ready for me?”

“Cheat-sheet?”

“What I’m supposed to say.”

I nod and round the desk.  I feel him follow me, a rush of heat at my back.  His hands descend on my neck when I pause to pass my hand over the great blue lens.  The listing I’ve made for him appears immediately, and I shift to one side, thinking that he will release me in order to focus on the ceremonial words.

Instead he trails his hands down my back as he sinks into his chair.  He holds my hips for a moment, while he settles himself, then tugs me down into his lap.  He strokes my head to one side, the way he did when he held me this morning, and reads over my shoulder.

“Liked this position better when you were wearin’ less,” he murmurs, and his shoulder shifts under my head.  The Rift clasp is probably prodding him uncomfortably.  Although it is no more than he deserves, I turn my head fractionally, so that only my coiled hair rests on his shoulder.

Despite the fact that we are both wearing more than we were this morning, his warmth swamps me.  Have I ever been so warm?  Maybe lying in the furs of my parents’ lodge as a child.  It is the same sort of sensual animal heat.  Since he seems to want nothing from me for the moment other than to sit still in his lap, I close my eyes and let myself drift in his warmth.

My mind ticks over the things I needed to do this morning.  I have left Veer instructions about my roses, and asked him to help me with bouquets for Aimi’s union ceremony.  I have selected a union gift that will please Aimi and scandalize Toal.  I have prepared everything for the two ceremonies today, and composed a short benediction for my Lord Zhylaw that I have some hope the Beast will let me sing, since he seems to like my singing.

A note about the benediction is in the datasheet the Beast reviews, so I divide my attention between listening for his reaction and my mental checklist.

I have made sure the Elemental is suitably housed, and by using the excuse of the two ceremonies today, avoided speaking with her at any length, an accomplishment that pleases me as well as any other this morning.  I have spoken with Chef about the Beast’s odd diet and suggested the imiree fruit.  I have warned Tiguan and Teshi, the Lord Marshal’s housekeeper, about the Beast’s unpredictable schedule.  I have told Halen about the Beast’s aversion to night clothes and sleeves.  I have checked on the Servant of the Table whose arm was broken at the feast last night and made sure that he was attended by a healer and excused from his duties for the day.  While I spoke to the various Servants, I distributed the rewards I selected for them and assured them of the Beast’s gratitude.

There is nothing I have forgotten, nothing left undone.  Although the Beast is unlikely to notice any of the things I have accomplished in the hours he’s been gone, I am satisfied that I have discharged my duties perfectly.  I have even said my morning prayers, including the second orison for my Lord Marshal, aloud and on my knees in the chapel, as is proper.

I can give myself a moment to lie in the Beast’s embrace and enjoy the solid heat of him at my back.

“Tired, Liaden?”

“No, Lord.”

He runs his fingers down my arm, crossed loosely over my waist.  His hand slides under mine, his thumb and forefinger slipping around my wrist, and lifts my hand up to his face.  I turn my head slightly so that I can see what he sees.  But I see nothing other than my hand, small and pale against his.  Unremarkable.  My fingers are slightly reddened from handling the rough chain coif and heavy armor, and I should buff my nails soon, but otherwise I see nothing offensive or unusual about my hand.

“Lyin’ to me’s becoming a habit for you,” he says.

I’m so shocked that I lift my head from his shoulder without thinking.  He growls and I quickly replace it.  “I’ve never . . .” A flare from my Collar makes me think better of what I’m about to say.  “I try to always tell you the truth, Lord.”

He turns his head so that his words feather across the exposed arch of my neck.  “That’s not quite the same thing.”

“I have only lied to you about one thing, Lord.  And I did not mean—”  I bite my lip, because I did mean to lie to him.  “I did not mean any harm by it.”

“Yeah, what was that?”  He finally lets my hand drop to my thigh, and covers it with his.

“You asked me . . . last night, you asked me if I was going anywhere.”

“I remember.”

“And I said ‘no,’ because I am not in the sense you meant.  But it was a lie, and I—”  I have to grit my teeth to get the next words out.  “I ask your forgiveness.”

The muscles under my back tense, and I expect him to eject me from his lap the way he did this morning.

Shame rains down on me.  I have displeased him _again_.  Why, why can I do nothing right when I serve this man?  I served Lord Zhylaw for entire _years_ without a single sign of dissatisfaction, but I am with the Beast for five minutes and he finds fault.

“Where’re you going?” he asks, his voice dropping into a deeper, angrier timber.

“To the Threshold.  I follow Lord Zhylaw.  As Dame Vaako said.”

He is silent, but the muscles under my back are as rigid as metal.  They would ring if I rapped my knuckles against them.

“When?” he says finally, a low, harsh expulsion of sound.

“Tomorrow evening.  On the third day of Mourning.”

“That’s two days.”

“We count the day of death as the first day.”

He blows out a breath through his nose that I feel ruffle across the skin of my neck.  “You Necros do everything backwards.”

His distaste for Necromongers and everything we stand for should be blazoned on his skin.  Why does he stay to lead us if he hates us so much?  Then I remember his words in the garden.  _Three million.  That’ll keep the mercs off my neck for a while_.  He may disparage my people and our Faith, but he is not disparaging of the might of the Necromonger army.

He is silent for a long time, and although I cannot see his face, I sense that he is angry, and that he is turning over factors I cannot comprehend.  There is nothing for me to consider.  I have my duty.  Death in Due Time is not to be feared.  If my heart is pure and my will is strong, I will not even feel any pain when I take the Knife.  I can only hope that my hand is steady.  I would not want to miss my heart on the first thrust the way Odyon did and have to have the Purifier finish the job.

Odyon . . . could Aimi have been right about her?

These considerations, however, are not what the Beast ponders.  Doubtless, he worries for his comfort and considers selection of a replacement.  If he asks, I will offer him some suggestions.  Some of the courtiers who came to training this morning would be good candidates.

But he does not ask.  He sighs and shifts in his chair.  Then he leans forward a little and taps the lens in front of us.  Whatever concerns he has about my death, he has moved on to the more pressing matter of the coming ceremony.  A practical Beast.

He scrolls through the ceremonial script slowly.

“That all there is to it?” he asks.

“Yes, Lord.”

He drops his chin to rest on the arch of my neck.  “I got some things to add at the end.  Where’ll you be?”

“I usually stand near the Tree of Pain during ceremonies.  At the Lord Marshal’s right hand, one step back.  Is there somewhere else you would prefer I be?”

“No.”

He does not elaborate.  Nor explain how where I am to stand relates to what he wants to add to the ceremony.  His commands are, as ever, opaque.

“If you are finished here, Lord, it is time to get you dressed.”

“In a minute.”  He lifts his chin from my neck and I can feel him looking at me.  His mouth brushes my ear as he whispers, “First I want to know why you smell so interesting.”

I choke.  And the beat between my legs that has finally quieted leaps back to life.

He chuckles.  “Better,” he says, although I can see nothing that has improved.

He turns the chair and finally releases me from his lap.  His warm hand lingers around my waist when he rises and follows me the few steps to the armor stand.  Anticipating an end to our détente over the question of the armor, I tense.

“I’ll wear the breastplate,” he says.  “An’ the arm and the shin guards.”

“What of the helmet?”  I protest.  A master Weaver must have spent hours on it, casting and hammering and polishing.  It is not from a mold like the Legionnaire’s helmets.  It is unique, made specially for the new Lord Marshal.  “And the cloak of rank?”

“Yeah, I’ll wear the cloak.  Keep me warm in this coffin.  You like the helmet so much, you carry it.”

I grit my teeth.  I will.  Just to spite him.

He offers no objection when I remove his clothes.  I am pleased to see that the undershirt has kept the Dyneemal from chafing his skin, and the bruises are healing very quickly.  All but the largest, on his back, have faded to purple and green.

Focusing on the state of his injuries helps me ignore the expanses of warm golden skin under my fingers.  The Beast watches me intently, but says nothing to taunt me, for once.  He makes his low, approving sound when I dress him in the leatheren tunic and trousers the Weavers have provided.  Although I prefer softer fabrics, I have to admire the leatheren.  It shines in the low light, with a faint iridescence like oil.  I run my hands over the back of the tunic, smoothing it into place, and marvel at the suppleness of the material.

I stop with my hands on the Beast’s hips, just above his buttocks.  The tunic falls a little further, down to his thighs.  But I am suddenly shy of letting my hands wander any further.

“You don’t gotta stop, Liaden,” he says, amusement and something else deepening his voice into that abyssal rumble that sends a shiver through me.

“Forgive me, Lord.  I was admiring the Weavers’ skill.  I forgot myself.”

The Beast chuckles.  “Careful not to forget yourself while you’re puttin’ on the pants.”

Chastened, I draw the trousers on quickly and efficiently.  I steal only one glance at his genitals.  His organ is a little larger than I remember from the bath, although still neither erect nor as large as Aimi suggested.  She must have been mistaken.

Shaking my head to remind myself of my duty, I check the bandages on his feet before I put on the tall, polished boots the Weavers have provided.  They look much better, although there is a blister on his heel that has burst and is seeping in a way I do not like.  As I re-wrap it, I make a mental note to tend his feet again tonight during his bath.  A few days of care and he will be able to walk without pain.  Even a Beast should appreciate that.

He sighs when I close the seals on his new boots.  Rocking back onto his heels and then up onto his toes, he smiles.  A true smile of satisfaction.  Halen should be here to see it; I’ll have to remember to tell him later.

When he is finally attired in all of the armor he will consent to wear, I tuck the heavy helmet under my arm and wait for him to precede me out of the chamber.  He scoops up the bulky bundle he set on the edge of the desk, and then holds out his elbow for me.

Although it is not wholly proper for me to walk by his side on a ceremonial occasion, I shift the helmet to my other side and take his arm.  Doubtless, he neither knows nor cares about the honor he does me, but it fills me with a gentle glow all the same.

Together, we walk out of the sanctum.  In the new boots, he moves more like a Lord Marshal should.  Proud and erect.  But his walk is still more of a prowl than my Lord Zhylaw’s dignified stride.  Still, the Beast’s walk is easier for me to keep pace with, particularly in the high-heeled boots I wear for the ceremony.  I hated trying to keep up with Zhylaw in heels.  I always felt like I was tottering after him.  For a moment, I envy the Beast’s grace.  He never totters.

“The ceremony will start in the Great Hall,” I say softly, when he hesitates at the doors of the outer chamber.

“Just wonderin’ if we should take the stairs with you in those heels,” he responds.

How did he _know_?  Can he sense my every weakness?  Does he read my body so well after such short acquaintance?

“I have managed the stairs in these heels dozens of times, Lord.  I will endeavor not to fall down them today.”

The Beast chuckles.  “Can always count on you to rise to a challenge, Liaden.  C’mon.”

On the stairs, he releases my arm and walks down a pace ahead of me, much more slowly than I know is his wont.  I am grateful for his sedate pace, and for my free hand so that I can manage my gown’s long skirts.  At the bottom of the stairs, he holds out his elbow again, and my gratitude flares into a fierce sense of pride that he would walk into the Great Hall with me on his arm.  Zhylaw never did so.

The court and an honor guard of armored soldiers have assembled in the Great Hall.  There is no blare of music, no sound of trumpets as we enter.  That is not the Necromonger way.  In gloom alleviated only by fire light, the assembled throng stands silently.  They have left a neat central aisle to the Throne, where the Vigil acolytes stand with a floating platform that bears my Lord Zhylaw’s holy Remains.

Seeing his body, even from a distance, tightens my throat.  I have not seen him since the acolytes removed his body while I was burning the girl Kyra.  That was less than eighteen hours ago.  But so much has happened in that short interval.  My entire world has turned upside-down.

Without realizing it, I grip the Beast’s arm tighter.  He glances down at me.  “It’s okay, Liaden,” he whispers.

It is not okay.  It will never be okay again.  But for his sake, and for the dignity of my station, I lift my chin and try to loosen my grip on his arm.

Each step we take towards the Throne reverberates inside the cavity of my chest.  The silence of the hall is oppressive, weighing on me until I cannot keep my head upright.  I bow it close to the Beast’s shoulder.  I feel the silent censure of the Dead growing stronger as we near, beating against my brain, pouring icily down my spine.  I have delayed in my duty.  None of the other First Concubines waited through the three days of Mourning before they followed their Lord Marshal.  But I have always thought their haste unseemly.  They left it to others to clean and dress the Remains?  To ensure that their Lords were interred in the Hall of Waiting with all due ceremony?  To say the orisons?  Disrespectful.  Particularly now, when the Beast has dismissed the other Concubines, so there is no one else to perform the final duties.

But what would Zhylaw say?  What will he say to me when we cross the Threshold?  Will he hold his hand out to me, as he did so many times, and smile his thin, chilly smile?  Will he even wait for me at the Threshold, or will he go on to the UnderVerse without me, assuming that I will follow?  Assuming that I will be there when he summons me, waiting patiently, invisibly, as always?

The Beast squeezes my hand between his elbow and the hard metal of his cuirass and I realize that while I have been lost in thought, we have reached the top of the stairs and stand before the Throne.  The Beast places the wrapped bundle he carries on the seat and spreads it open.  Within lie a number of weapons, their fine workmanship obvious even at a cursory glance.  I smile to myself.  He liked my suggestion.

But there are many weapons, not just two.  I wonder, fleetingly, what he plans to do with the rest of them.

At his nod, I place his helmet on the armrest of the Throne.  We turn to face the Court, and I take a step back, slowly and deliberately, mindful of the long prongs of the Tree of Pain behind me.

Without warning, the Beast takes my hand and draws me forward to stand at his side.  I glance up at his face in surprise, but it tells me nothing.  He surveys the court with a cool, almost disdainful expression, not meeting my eyes.

“Today we honor the fallen and the risen,” he says, repeating the ceremonial words I found for him and carefully worked together.  “Sayin’ farewell to the old Lord Marshal.  Welcoming a new Purifier.”

He abbreviates the ritual phrases even further, but there is nothing disrespectful in it.  It is simply his clipped, curt way of speaking.  And his sonorous tone makes up in gravity whatever his words lack in brevity.

I watch his face while he speaks.  Nothing of the contempt he normally shows for all things Necromonger shows.  His face is grave, his silver eyes somber.  He has never indicated any feeling for my Lord Zhylaw except scorn, but now he speaks of Zhylaw as though he was a worthy adversary.  He recites Zhylaw’s achievements in the Campaign, and I hear no hint of mockery.

I was wrong to ever think his face unrevealing.  He expresses so much with just the curl of his mouth, the angle and shading of his eyes.  He is more subtle than most men, but emotive nonetheless.  How could I not have seen these things before?

Finally, he looks down at me.  Light that has nothing to do with the hall’s flickering illumination slides through his eyes.  He smiles very slightly.

“Your turn,” he whispers.

With a start, I realize that he has finished the eulogy and waits for me to sing the benediction.  Bowing my head, I begin to sing.  I should be bowing my head over my clasped hands, but the Beast still holds my left hand and shows no sign of letting go.  I should feel something other than the slow waves of warmth spreading up from our joined hands.  The shock and grief that I felt when I first felt Zhylaw’s death.  The confusion of the Beast’s presence on the Throne.  The pitiless chill that I felt on entering the Hall and seeing the Remains.  But I feel none of that, only a spreading heat.  It lets me finish the benediction in clear, pure tones.  Trailing off the last note, I sigh with relief.  I have disgraced neither my station nor my Lord.  I have served with honor.

The Beast squeezes my hand, and I catch the flash of his eyes before he looks over at the Vigil acolytes.  At his nod, they escort the remains slowly down the steps of the Throne and along the long aisle.  Each person, officer, commander and solider, bows their head as the floating bier passes.  But there are no other demonstrations of grief.  I suppose I should not expect any.  It is not the Necromonger way.  But I feel a twinge at the absence of more demonstrative grieving all the same.

As the bier reaches the back of the Hall, the Beast speaks.  “Edellis.”

The purifier looks up from the coven of purple robes gathered at the base of the Throne.  His eyes flick to me and I see their hopeful glitter.  How disappointed he will be when he discovers the Beast only appeases him, not that he has been chosen.  I drop my head to hide a smile.

“Kneel, Edellis,” the Beast intones, his voice so deep it should rise from the stones of the Basilica itself.  I control a shiver.  If he ever commanded me that way . . .

I wait for the Beast to take up one of the weapons that sit on the Throne behind us and give it to Edellis.  Since I was unsure if he would choose to honor Edellis and Bialy, I did not script anything for him other than the recitation of Cengis’s accomplishments.  I am curious to see what he will say about the other two.

Instead he says, “Rise, Purifier.”

It takes me a moment to understand, and then I look up at him in shock.

No!  It was supposed to be Cengis.  Not Edellis.  Not that grasping, lecherous disgrace to his station.  _Why_?  Why would the Beast listen to me, read the script I prepared for him, and then do this?!

I bite my lip to keep from crying out in confusion and disgust.  The Beast does not look at me, although he must feel me stiffen.  He waits patiently until the other purifiers realize, as I have, what his words mean.  Slowly, they cluster around Edellis to clothe him in his new robes of rank.  When they are finished, the Beast releases my hand to take the cap of office from Bialy and place it on Edellis’s head.

When the Beast reaches for my hand again, I have crossed it primly in front of me, holding my right wrist with my left hand.  Out of his reach.

The Beast lets his hand drop to his side.

Edellis stands, pride swelling his stocky frame.  His lip curls slightly as he smoothes the wide silver belt wrapped around his waist, the mark of the Purifier Principal.  He should grovel before the Lord Marshal until he is dismissed.  But he is puffed with his promotion, and no true Lord Marshal stands before him, only a Beast too foolish and too cruel to heed those who would try to advise him.

I look away.

“I will serve the Faith and the Flock, Lord Marshal,” Edellis declares.  ‘Til UnderVerse come.”

When I realize he has omitted declaring his allegiance to the Lord Marshal, I glance back, only to find Edellis staring at me.  The naked greed in his eyes makes me take an unthinking step closer to the Beast.

The Beast nods and Edellis does not wait for any further dismissal before whirling his new robes around him and striding down the steps.  I want to hiss after him.  Grasping, lecherous pig of a man.  He and the Beast deserve each other.

The Beast calls Bialy and Cengis before him in turn and presents them with two of the weapons from the pile behind him.  He says little other than to thank them for their service to the old Lord Marshal.

Each of them pledge to serve not only Faith and Flock, but also the new Lord Marshal.  Listening to them, my head bowed so that none can see my expression, I grind my teeth with fury.  They are True.  Either would have been a better choice than Edellis.  I told him so.  And he chose Edellis anyway.

After Cengis rises, I expect the ceremony to be over.  Schooling my expression, I lift my head.

Instead, the Beast says, “Toal.”

The big black man immediately strides out of the group of commanders at the base of the Throne and up the steps to kneel in front of the Beast.  Despite the alacrity of his response, I can tell from the slight wrinkle of Toal’s usually unperturbed brow that he did not expect this summons.

The Beast picks up a pair of beautifully wrought daggers, their grips molded in the shapes of screaming women, and holds them out to Toal.  I recognize the blades; I pointed them out to the Beast only last night.  Zoelle and Zurina, the Banshees.  They are soul-stealers, like my Pins.

“For your loyalty.  First among commanders,” the Beast says.

Toal accepts the blades wordlessly, but his eyes glisten overbright.

I stifle a sniff.  His loyalty is easily bought.

“Scales,” the Beast calls, and the phantom-pale commander replaces the midnight-dark one at the Beast’s feet.

The Beast takes a sword from the rapidly-dwindling pile of weapons and holds it out to Scales.  The red pommel-stone makes the weapon immediately recognizable.  Chaylen, the Red Stream.  Another blade I pointed out to the Beast during our tour of the armory.

“Take it and cleanse the Galinites,” says the Beast.

I narrow my eyes at the two men.  Chaylen was Kryll’s own blade.  He used Chaylen when he declared his Due Time rather than Neirja, the sacrificial dagger.  Since that time, the wounds Chaylen inflicts cannot be staunched, leaving the afflicted to bleed white from even a minor injury.  I wonder if the Beast knows what a treasure he hands so casually to his commander.

Scales knows.  His eyes widen and he bows until his forehead nearly touches the Beast’s boots before he takes the scabbarded blade.  “As you command, my Lord Marshal.  I will bleed their homeworlds until not a drop of Galinite blood remains unspilled.”

Another whose loyalty is easily bought.

The Beast nods and calls Scalp-Taker.

I have a fleeting hope that Scalp-Taker will not be so easily swayed.  But he kneels before the Beast and when the Beast offers him a massive two-handed sword, he takes it with a bow almost as low as Scales’s.

“Meerah, the Pathfinder,” the Beast says, repeating the name I told him last night.  “Take it and clear our way to the Threshold.”

The Scalp-Taker’s habitual scowl lightens as the meaning of the Beast’s words penetrates.  The Beast has found him untold numbers to kill.  “Yes, my Lord Marshal.  At once, my Lord Marshal.”

Pathetic, how easily these great men of the Faith are bought.

“Vaako,” the Beast says, his tone darker and deeper than ever.

White-lipped and sweating, the Traitor takes Scalp-Taker’s place at the Beast’s feet.  Any hope I nurtured of vengeance was crushed at the feast last night.  And so, resigned, I wait to see what the Beast plans for Vaako.

The Beast does not offer the remaining weapon on the seat of the Throne to Vaako.  Instead, he unclips his cloak, removes it from around his shoulders, and settles it around Vaako’s.

I nearly strangle on my horror.  The Weavers made that cloak for _him_.  It is a garment of highest rank, graven with the Lord Marshal’s own sigils.  To give it to the _Traitor_. . .

“You were first among commanders.  Now you are first among my advisors.  Keeper of the Faith.”  The Beast’s voice drops so that only Vaako and I can hear him.  “Don’t betray it again.”

Vaako clutches at the cloak, breathing hard and staring up at the Beast with pyretic eyes.  “Never, my Lord Marshal.  Never again.”

The Beast holds Vaako’s gaze for a long moment before he nods.  “Watch Officer Daray.”

A ripple of surprise runs through the silent crowd.  A young man in a flight officer’s black uniform steps out of the assembly near the back of the Hall and quickly makes his way up the aisle.  I do not recognize him, but there are many lesser officers I do not know personally.  As Daray draws close to the Throne, I take his measure and see why the Beast might have chosen him.  Despite the unexpected summons, he walks with a firm, purposeful step.  His face is set, his light eyes alert.  He is not as physically imposing as the Beast or Toal, but he has the solid muscularity of a warrior.

As is proper, Daray kneels on the bottom step of the Throne, not climbing upwards until the Beast waves him forward.

I expect the Beast to pick up the last weapon, a small dagger.  But instead he takes the new helm off the arm of the Throne and holds it out to Daray.  The skullhelm?  He gives a watch officer the _skullhelm_?

“Commander Daray,” the Beast says, and I watch amazement fill the officer’s hazel eyes.  He had no idea this promotion was coming.  “You’ll lead my lensor teams.”

“Yes, my Lord Marshal,” Daray answers firmly, despite his amazement.  “It is my great honor.”

The Beast nods and the new commander rises.  Gritting my teeth as I watch Daray walk away with the Beast’s helm, I wait for the Beast to call another name, to bestow the last weapon.  It will likely be another officer I don’t know, since I am less familiar with even the senior officers than with the commanders.  Through my fury, I make a mental note to tell the Servants of the Table about Daray’s promotion so they know to inform him of feasts, and to find out if Daray has a companion.

Involved in my thoughts and my anger, I do not register my name when the Beast says it.

“Liaden,” he repeats.

I start to answer him, but then the tone and volume sink into my brain.  He calls _me_ before him?

Confused but anxious not to ruin the ceremony, I step down and turn to stand in front of him.  Without thinking, I kneel.

The Beast smiles slowly and offers me the last weapon.

“Hannelore,” he says.  He does not have to tell me the rest of the knife’s name or her history.  Hannelore the Maiden.  Her kiss ignites a man’s blood and stops his heart.  Covu’s daughter fought the Austeres with her, and no one has wielded her since Erizebet fell beneath the Austeres’ blades.  I did not point out Hannelore to him, because until today she resided not in the armory but in the Lord Marshal’s vault.  I wonder how he found her.

“For your loyalty to your Lord Marshals.  Old and new.”

The blade calls to me, a siren’s song in my mind.  Men have handled her since she fell from Erizebet’s dying grasp, and she would have none of them, turning on them whenever they tried to use her.  She wants a woman’s hand again, a woman who will fight and die in the defense of her Lord Marshal.

But the Beast is no true Lord Marshal.

Holding the Beast’s eyes, I take the blade.  I cannot refuse her.  Not so publicly.  And not with her lorelei’s call still whirling through my brain.

But when we are alone . . . the Beast will learn I am not so easily bought.

 

The Beast shows no interest in mingling with the courtiers after the ceremony.  He offers me his arm and we leave the Great Hall as we entered, in silence.  Neither of us speak as we make our way up the spiral stairs to the Lord Marshal’s chambers, but the Beast seems to sense my inner tumult.  He does not offer me his arm at the top of the stairs.  Instead, his hand settles on my neck, propelling me through the outer chamber and into the sanctum.

There, I break free of him and stalk towards my chamber.  I want to rage, to throw things, to stab with my beautiful, seductive new dagger.

He ignored me and promoted _Edellis_.  Sneaking, lustful Edellis, who will now have access to me whenever he chooses.  The Lord Marshal’s quarters are open to the Purifier Principal, as is any other space on the Basilica.  And Edellis leading the Flock?!  It would be laughable if it wasn’t so appalling.  Perhaps Edellis can bed all of the new converts – in the name of Education, of course – after I am gone.

And then to offer me Hannelore!  To try to appease me with the very trick I taught him.  I could not be more insulted if he had slapped me.

I want to throw the dagger away from me.  To grind her under my heel on the way to my chamber to show my contempt for his sop.  But, glancing at the sheathed blade clenched in my right hand, I cannot.  She is too beautiful, too rare a treasure to be treated so badly.  It is not her fault that a Beast has used her this way.

Clutching the dagger to my breast, I round the Beast’s bed.

“Liaden, get back here,” the Beast growls.

I cast a dark glance over my shoulder.  “What does the Lord require?”

“You to stop stompin’ around and come over here.”

How dare he?  I no more stomp than I sulk.

Pivoting on my heel, I whirl around to glare at him.

He leans against the desk.  Fatigue hollows his cheeks, paints inky shadows around the brilliance of his pupils.  He crosses his arms over his chest and glares back at me.

Seeing his exhaustion draws me up short, throws water on the fire of my rage.  I should have seen the signs before.  I should have remembered the trials he has been through, the battles and the healing and the broken sleep, and taken better care of him.

I walk toward him, and when I reach him, kneel to take off his greaves and boots.  “Did _you_ sleep badly, Lord?”

His hand drops onto my head, fingers moving over the coils of braid.  “Best sleep I’ve had in years.  Just not enough of it,” he says quietly.

“You can rest now.”

“Yeah.  Liaden, take this out.”  He tugs on my coiffure.  “Can’t get my hands through it.”

There is nothing to be gained in thwarting him, and no pleasure in it in the face of his depletion.  I remove the Rift clasp and carefully set it on the floor next to Hannelore.  Without the clasp, my braids unwind down my back.  I free the tiny gemmed clips at the bottom of each braid and run my fingers through my hair until it fans, kinked and wild, around my back and shoulders.

The Beast sighs and sinks his hand into my hair.  As I finish removing the greaves, he tugs me upright to face him, fingers caressing the back of my neck.

“You’re angry ‘cause I picked Edellis.”

His evident exhaustion and soft touch make me moderate the response I would have liked to throw at him.  “The Lord’s selection of a Purifier Principal is none of my concern,” I say evenly.

“Yeah, you’re pissed.”  He rolls his neck until I hear something pop.  “Toal and Scales wanted him.  They felt Cengis was too new.”

They would.  Toal has been a Necromonger since he was barely old enough to lift a pulse rifle.  He doesn’t trust anyone as recently converted as Cengis.

And _he_ would, too.  Siding with his commanders to cement their loyalty.  Even if they are wrong.  _Wrong_.  But their loyalty matters to him more than mine.  After all, I’m just his servant, and I will be gone in another day.

I busy myself removing his bracers.  “The Lord’s esteemed commanders are entitled to their opinions, of course.  It simply puzzles me that the Lord would solicit my opinion when the Lord planned to ignore whatever advice I offered.”

“I didn’t—” he growls.  Then he shakes his head.  “Fightin’ with you’s harder than fightin’ with Vaako.  Least I knew how he was gonna come at me.”

The rebuke bows my head, but the Beast cups his hand around the back of my skull and tilts my head upright.  “I listened to everything you said,” he says softly.

And _ignored_ it.

I concentrate on the clasps of his cuirass to avoid meeting his eyes.  “I am pleased to be of some small service to the Lord.”

“Liaden—” he growls.  The rough note, of warning.  “I’m not gonna fight with you every time I make a call you don’t like.  I gave you that blade—”

 _That_ is too much.  For him to admit his manipulation so baldly.  “I am not one of your brainless commanders to be so easily bought—”

“I gave it to you to show you an’ everyone else how important you are t’me,” he roars.  “Don’t make me regret it!”

He has never raised his voice to me before.  I bow my head in shame.  “Forgive me, Lord.”

He takes a step away from me and yanks at the side clasps on his cuirass until it falls to the floor with a clatter that makes me wince.  I reach to help him out of the rest of his armor, but he pushes my hand away.  “I’ll do this,” he snaps, his voice flat with anger.  “You go change.”

Change?  Into what?  “Does my gown displease you?”

“Wear what you wore last night,” he growls.  “And wipe that shit off your skin.  I don’t want it all over my hands.”

I begin to tremble.  His anger is a fearsome thing.  I’ve pushed him too far, when he is too tired, and I sense that something in him has snapped.  Will he use me now?  When he is so angry?  Will I be able to appease him with any of the things I have practiced so that the first time will not be so bad?

Shaking, I walk with as much composure as I can manage into my chamber.  Afraid of what he will do if he finds me naked, I duck into my wardrobe to hastily strip off my ceremonial gown and pull on a fresh nightgown.  I have nothing in my chamber with which to wash off the paler, so I remove it as best I can with the cloths I use to clean my weapons.

Fearful of angering him further by my delay, I hurry back into the sanctum.

The Beast is already in bed, staring up at the Threshold Ceiling, his powerful arms behind his head.  He does not look at me when I approach the bed, but growls, “Lights.”

My heart in my throat, I put my hands to my Collar and choke out the command.

The faint glow of the Threshold Ceiling gleams off his eyes when he finally glances at me.  He rolls up onto one elbow and stares at me.  Then he smiles slowly.

“Sexy, Liaden,” he says, with a nod at my feet.  “But save ‘em for another time.”

I follow his eyes and realize that, in my consternation, I’ve failed to take off my high-heeled boots.  Grimacing, I bend over to remove them.

“Wait,” says the Beast, and I freeze.  “Let me.”

He pats the edge of the bed.  Warily, I sink down onto it, and when he holds out his hand, offer him my foot.

He smiles wickedly, an expression that leaves me in no doubt as to his carnal intent.  With two fingers, he walks the silken skirt of my nightgown up over my knee and pushes it down around my thigh.  My breath, quick and nervous, sounds loud in my ears.  His fingers circle my kneecap, once, twice, a delicate wash of heat.  Then his palm slips around to cradle my calf.  He cups his other hand around my heel.  Running his thumb over the ankle clasp of the boot, he eases it off my foot and tosses it over the edge of the bed.  Vaguely, as if from a great distance, I hear it hit the floor with a thump.

Instead of releasing my foot, he presses the heel of his palm against my instep.  His fingers squeeze the edge of my foot, massaging.  The gentle pressure ripples up through my leg, intensified by the presence of his hand on my calf.  It tightens the muscles of my inner thighs, and starts a fresh beat in my core.

The Beast grins.  “Much better.  Other foot.”

He disposes of my other boot quickly and places my feet together on the bed in front of him.  Setting the tips of his fingers to my skin, he strokes the outside of my legs from ankle to thigh, pushing my skirt up to my hips.  “Shame to hide all this.”

Reeling with the swirl of uncertainty and need that he rouses in me with so few words and touches, I choke out, “A Concubine reserves her glory for her Lord and reveals her full beauty to no other.”

The Beast tilts his head, and wicked amusement flashes through his eyes.  “Yeah?”  His fingertips glide over the rounded tops of my thighs, nudging the edge of my skirt higher.  “Anything else you want to show me?”

What will appease him?  What will disperse any lingering anger and blunt the edge of his cruel humor that, I sense, if turned against me here and now, will hurt worse than any blow?

Hesitantly, biting my lip, I begin to part my thighs.

The Beast’s eyes flash downward, and I hear a sudden, sharp intake of breath.  If he can see so well that he could find my hand in the dark, he will know now that I wear nothing under the gown.

His fingers tighten on my thighs.  Then he shakes his head and presses my legs together.  “Save that for last.  Show me somethin’ else first.”

What else have I to show him?  He’s seen me naked.  But it was from behind.  Maybe he wants to see my breasts?

I reach up, trying hard to control the shaking of my hands, and push the straps of my nightgown off my shoulders.  The fabric moves over my skin in a caress, a cool counterpoint to the heat of his hands.  Before I bare my breasts, the straps catch on my upper arms.  The wide neckline is not quite wide enough.

With a soft growl, the Beast reaches out and flicks open the front closure.  The gown falls open to my waist.

Cold air, and the inferno of the Beast’s gaze, flow over my skin.

I brace myself on my hands, fighting the urge to shrink away.  He neither expects nor wants a shy virgin.  And I have nothing to be ashamed of.  I may not have Aimi’s statuesque curves, but my small breasts are firm, and my skin is smooth and unblemished.

The Beast sucks his lower lip into his mouth, teeth and eyes gleaming.  “Lie down, Liaden,” he says roughly.

I start to lie back, expecting him to rise up over me.  Will he use me immediately?  Is there time for me to do as Aimi instructed?  Seize the initiative and relieve him before he puts himself inside me?  How do I begin?

But the Beast shifts over in the bed and pats the sheets beside him.

Obediently, I turn and arrange myself, pushing the bodice of my nightgown down to my hips.  The Beast rumbles approvingly.  He runs the tip of one finger down my midline, from my Collar to my navel.

Now he will use me.  I reach for him, hoping to forestall him.

He turns his back to me, and lies down with his head pillowed on my chest.

I stare at the top of his head in shock.  He _turns his back_ on my nakedness?

“Gimme your hair.”

Stunned, trying vainly to process his actions, I lift my head and sweep my hair under my neck, down over my shoulder and arm.  He reaches out, the bulge of his biceps gleaming in the low light, and tangles his hand in my hair.

I lie motionless, waiting, wondering.  Aimi said to take the initiative, to relieve him first.  But did she know the Beast would do this?  Make me expose myself and then use my breasts like a pair of fleshy pillows?

The Beast pulls the coverlet over us and relaxes back into me.  His weight presses me deep into the mattress.  I can see no way for him to use me from this position.  He plans to sleep, and merely amuses himself by sleeping with his head between my bare breasts.  My nakedness means nothing to him.  The hunger that he has awakened, aching under my skin, chewing into my viscera, more fierce than the ache in my empty belly, means nothing to him.  The shame of it is worse than his earlier anger.

I lie staring up at the softly glowing Ceiling, awash in humiliation.  What can I do?  This is worse than fearing his rage or suffering his anger.  How can I make myself real to him?  Make myself more important than the pillows we lie on or the sheets that cover us?  If I touch him?  Will he see me as a person instead of shapely furniture then?

Tentatively, I put my hands on his shoulder and brow.  When he rumbles approvingly, I begin to stroke his forehead.

“Would you like me to sing for you, Lord?”

It will not be a lullaby I sing him now.

“Tell me why you hate Edellis instead,” he murmurs.

“I don’t hate Edellis,” I say.  I fear him.  I fear the way he looks at me, a look that even in my innocence I recognize as unnatural, unhealthy.  And I fear the terrible temptation he offers.  Freedom, unimaginable, undutiful freedom . . .

The Beast chuckles.  “Okay, tell me what Edellis did to make you dislike him so much.”

His hand slides under the coverlet, skimming down my hip.  Tugging my skirts out of his way, he draws my knee against his side and begins to stroke me, slowly, from calf to thigh.

I didn’t think anything could increase the heat washing through me from his body lying so hot and heavy against mine.  But I was wrong.  His caress runs through me like a fever, making my skin dew with sweat.

“He is not true to his station,” I say, trying to focus on his question to distract me from his touch.

“In what way?” the Beast whispers.  His voice is thinning toward sleep.  If I can sidestep his questions for a little while, he will drift off with them unanswered, leaving me aching and unsatisfied, but at least he will not learn the truth.

“A purifier should be devoted to his Faith, his Flock and his Lord Marshal.  His own interests should count for nothing in the face of his duty,” I say, an answer I have given him before.

The Beast rubs his head against me.  “Not everyone takes their duties as seriously as you, Liaden.”

“A purifier should.  Particularly a purifier elite like Edellis—”  _Was_ , before the Beast named him Purifier Principal.  I push that thought aside in the name of the tentative harmony we’ve achieved.  “Particularly the Keeper of the Scepter.”

The Beast chuckles and rubs his palm over my knee.  “What happened, he make a play for you?”

I never would have volunteered it.  But I will not lie to the Beast again, not even to save a life.  “Yes,” I say quietly.

The Beast tenses, and his hand fists in my hair.  “When?” he growls.

Every time he looks at me with those greedy, assessing eyes.  But the Beast would not understand that.  “He told me of his . . . desires two years ago.”

“An’ you didn’t say anything?  Or didn’t _he_ care?”

 _He_ being my Lord Zhylaw.  And, yes, he would have cared, if only because he was the only one allowed to covet me.  “I said nothing.  It seemed a foolish thing to end a man’s life over.”

The Beast rumbles, but it is not an approving sound.  “Think so?”

I bite my lip and stare up at the shimmering Ceiling.  I should have found a way to avoid answering his question.

“Thought you had a real thing about loyalty,” the Beast says.  “You wanted me to kill Vaako.”

How did he know?  Was I so obvious?  I frown up at the Ceiling.  “Vaako tried to kill the Lord Marshal.  There is no greater crime.”

“Yeah, well, I’ve always been a criminal,” the Beast murmurs, and I can hear the grim amusement curving his mouth, even though I cannot see it.  “I’da figured making a play for the Lord Marshal’s concubine ranked up there, though.”

I struggled with the same question for many nights, lying sleepless and frightened in my cold bed, listening to Zhylaw working at his desk and wondering if I should tell him.  Wondering what he would do to Edellis – and to me – if I did.  Wondering if there was any chance, however remote, that Edellis’s claim to be able to remove the Collar could be true.

“Desire is no crime,” I say carefully, thinking of Aimi and Toal.  “It is the act that is the betrayal.  Edellis _did_ nothing.  He merely let his desires be known.”

“Just so we’re clear, that counts in my book.”  His tone drops so low it becomes the voice of stone.  “Anyone else lets their desires be known, you fuckin’ better let _me_ know.”

Since the likelihood of that in the next day seems low, I feel no compunction in saying, “Yes, Lord.”

He tugs on my hair.  “When we’re alone, call me Riddick.”

Impossible.  Deference to his title is too ingrained into me.  “I’ll try.”

He grunts.  His hand in my hair relaxes and he begins stroking my leg again.  “You didn’t mention any of this this mornin’.”

“It didn’t seem pertinent.”

“Does to me.  You start tellin’ me the truth – the whole truth, not the pieces you like to feed me – and we’ll get along better, Liaden.”

His new rebuke sears, and it is one more than I can take, particularly lying under him half-naked, my blood beating frantically with each stroke of his hand, and yet ignored.  I stare up the Ceiling, blinking back tears.

The Beast rolls off me and onto his elbows, trapping my hair underneath his arms as he shifts up the bed to look me in the face.  “What the fuck is wrong—”

How does he read me so easily?  Despite the pain of my hair, which feels as though it being wrenched out at the roots, I turn my head so that I don’t have to look into those wicked silver eyes.  “Nothing, Lord.  You must be tired—”

He moves so rapidly I cannot follow him, scooping my hair out of the way, shifting me somehow so that I end up under him.  His head blocks even the faint light of the Ceiling, and all I can see in the chiaroscuro is the lambent gleam of his eyes.

He cradles my head between his hands and gazes down at me.  “Relax, Liaden,” he whispers.

He lowers his head and brushes his mouth across mine.  Those same soft kisses from the garden, which make my entire body pound.  I want to lie under him unmoved.  To show the same disdain for his touch that he has shown for my nakedness.  But the brush of his mouth, the heat of his skin laid across mine, renew the howling torment of blood and bone that aches so fiercely for him.  I cannot stop my arms from circling his broad back and pulling him down on me.  I want more, more of his weight on me, more of his flesh on me and in me.

But he gives me none of it.  He kisses me tenderly, and without any sign of the roaring craving I feel.  After only a few kisses – far too few – he lifts his head.  He brushes my hair back from my face, and smiles at me, a glint of teeth in the darkness.  I cannot tell if it is a cruel smile or a true one.

Then he slides down my body.  My breath catches.  Aimi said he might . . .

His cheek, slightly rough, scrapes the sensitized skin above my left breast.  He stretches across me, gathering me, positioning me, his arm around my waist and his thigh between mine, heavy and hot through my skirt.  He lays his head down.

With a whisper, he gathers my hair in his free hand.  With a sigh, he relaxes across me.

“Get some sleep,” he murmurs.

And I contain my tears through the long moments until he drifts off and his deep, even breathing fans across my bare skin. 


	12. Chapter 12

I wake to a sense of suffocation.  Of a weight so great that I cannot draw breath.  Still struggling up through the veils of sleep, I shift, my body flexing, as I try to breathe.

The weight on me moves, lessens enough that my compressed lungs can draw air.  A flood of sensation follows the trickle of air.  Heat.  Heat that makes my skin run with sweat, sticking wetly to the hot flesh pressed against mine.  Heat and pressure across my chest and stomach, hips and thighs, fusing me into the mattress, melting my core.  Heat sliding up my side, gliding over slick skin, to cup my breast.

Heat and sharp pressure, the edge of teeth, sinking into the curve of my captured breast.

I jolt, my hands gripping skin and broad planes of muscle, and open my eyes.

The Threshold Ceiling shines above me, casting its dim glow over black linens and rich gold skin.  The Beast’s smooth scalp and engulfing shoulders fill my vision.  The sensation of his teeth sinking into my flesh fills my world.  Pleasure that dances in and out of pain bows my back, dissolves my core.

The Beast’s hand slides under my back, fingers splaying across the metal spine of the Collar.  Sparks flare and swirl up my spine, across my skin.  He holds me tightly to him.  His mouth slides across my breast, a searing wetness, and his teeth close down again.

I writhe under him.  I can’t help it.  I want to hold still and show him nothing.  To make him pay for my tears and frustration.  But I am too enflamed.  My hunger is so great I must glow with it.  If I don’t vent, I’ll combust.  His mouth moves again, and his teeth sink in, moving ever closer to my nipple.  I keen.

The Beast chuckles into my skin.  “You make it _extremely_ hard to wait, Liaden.”

“Don’t,” I gasp, tugging on his shoulders.

He nuzzles my breast.  “Oh, yeah, we’re waitin’.  This is too good to rush.”  Between bites he says, “I want the whole night.  No interruptions.  No distractions.  An’ no arguments.”

I need to scream.  I cannot draw breath for it, but I must scream.  He plans to torture me for the rest of the day?  To leave me this hungry for uncounted hours?  “No,” I groan, the thread of sound all I can manage on the little air I have.

He rises on his forearms, sliding up me until he can look down into my eyes.  His body grinds along mine, hard ripples of muscle powering him across my skin.

“Keep arguin’ with me, Liaden,” he growls, but it is a soft, playful growl.  “An’ I’ll make you wait another day.”

By which time I will be dead.  But at least I will have escaped this torment.

He smiles, and rolls off me, but not before I feel, pressed hard against my thigh, the evidence of his arousal.

Gasping with the sudden onrush of air, I struggle upright, needing to see, wanting confirmation of what I felt.  He moves away from the bed with his back to me.  I can see nothing but the rolling muscles of his back and buttocks.  Without waiting for me to dress him, he pulls on his leatheren trousers, covering himself.

He rounds the desk and seats himself in the great chair, but not before I see the bulge at his groin.

I wasn’t imagining it.

“Lights to twenty percent,” he says, passing his hand over the desk’s lens.

I blink in the low light, still uncertain, still wondering.  Did he ignore me out of indifference, or was it just exhaustion?  Does he truly enjoy me so much that he doesn’t want to rush using me?  Has he suppressed his own need as ruthlessly as he has roused mine?

“Liaden,” he says, and I snap my head up to find him watching me, his eyes hooded.  “Good as you look sittin’ there, I got work to do.”

Recalling my duty in a hot rush, I throw aside the coverlet and scramble to the edge of the bed.  “Yes, Lord.”

“Riddick,” he says, correcting me.  “An’ you don’t have to go flying around.  Just cover up.  You’re distracting me.”  His smile stretches into a wicked grin.

I glance down, realizing that my nightgown is still around my waist.  My skin, sweat-slick and faintly golden without the paler, shines back at me.  Bite marks trail up my left breast like raw brands.

My hands go to my waist, to yank up the bodice of the gown.

A tiny sound from the Beast, barely more than an exhalation, stops me.

He desires me.  He has left his mark in my flesh.  With the clarity of sleep, I realize that his anger over Edellis was jealousy, not castigation.  He wants _me_ . . .

I slide off the edge of the bed and stand slowly.  Instead of pulling up the gown, I push it off over my hips.  With a whisper, the gown falls to the floor.

Another sound from the Beast, this one a fraction louder, and much deeper.

Holding his eyes, I step out of the puddle of gown and stand in front of him.  I do not shrink.  I do not smile.  I stand naked and proud, sublimely aware, for the first time, of the power of my own skin.

When his eyes flare to crucibles, I turn and walk slowly into my chamber to dress.

 

When I return, my hair brushed but unbound, clad only in the loose, sleeveless robe in which I will bathe him, his eyes have burned down to embers.

He holds his hand out to me and seats me in his lap.  I lean back against him and rest my head against his shoulder in the position he prefers.  His hand tangles in my hair as though it belongs there.

“Gonna get you for that, Liaden,” he growls.  But there is no force behind it.  It is a playful growl, the kind Tihamner would give his mate.

 _I look forward to it_.  But that is too bold to say aloud.  It could not have been half as exciting for him to watch me as it was for me to be watched.  My skin still tingles with it.  And anticipation of tonight burns inside me like a hundred suns gone nova.  “What can I help you with?”

“Still can’t find the Armada specs,” he grumbles.

Together, we search the Basilica’s databases until we compile all of the surviving ships into a master list.  The Beast reviews them carefully, transferring ship designations into two sub-lists.  He says little, working intently, but his hand remains in my hair, rubbing the strands together as he contemplates specifications, crew requirements, cargo capacities.  Occasionally he reaches up to stroke my neck.  His awareness of me, his soft, sporadic caresses, move me on a level I cannot contemplate.  They are more than the fierce sexual hunger he raises in me.  I was wrong to think him callous or indifferent.  He doesn’t touch me as a piece of furniture, or a servant, or even a pet.  He touches me as something he values, as something, _someone_ , who has meaning to him.

My mind shies away from that thought and I concentrate on the data in the lens.

“What are these two smaller lists?” I ask.

He taps the longer one.  Eight dreadnoughts, fifty frigates, two thousand fighters, and a host of supporting vessels.  “These go with Scales to Galin.”  His finger slides across the lens to the smaller list.  Two dreadnoughts, thirty frigates, a thousand fighters, and a smaller complement of supporting ships.  “These go ahead with Scalp-Taker.”

Large forces for the task he has assigned to each, but not the numbers Zhylaw would have thrown at them.  Zhylaw believed in overwhelming numbers.  “Scales may be pressed to conquer all six of the Galin worlds with only eight dreadnoughts.”

The Beast brushes my hair off my neck and rests his chin on the curve of it.  “That obvious?”

“No, not obvious . . . is that what you want?  For Scales to fail?”  Does he hate the people he leads so much that he would send insufficient numbers against the Galinites, hoping that they will fail?

“Want it to be a challenge.  An’ I don’t want to leave the rest of the Armada with less than eight dreadnoughts.  Not when no-one can tell me what’s between here and the Threshold.”

I hadn’t thought of the fleet that would be left behind.  “Why not send the whole Armada against the Galinites?”

“Too slow.  We push for the Threshold at the best speed of the slower ships, we could make it in two years.  We detour the whole Armada to Galin and it’ll take five.  I’m not waitin’ that long.”

Two years.  So soon!  The Campaign that has gone on for two hundred years could be over in just two more?  The thought nearly stops my heart.  I had no idea it would be so soon.

“So.  Whaddo you think?”

I nod against his shoulder.  “I think it a good plan.  Scales will like the challenge.  Scalp-Taker will be kept occupied.  The only opposition you may face is from those left behind.  They will be envious of Scales and Scalp-Taker’s good fortune.”

The Beast makes a deep sound in his chest.  Satisfaction.  “Good.  If it gets by you, it’ll get by Toal and the others.  You’re a tougher critic than any of them.”

“I’m sorry—” I begin to say, and then realize that he’s teasing me.  “That your plans are so weak a simple servant can poke holes in them.”

He chuckles and nips my neck.

 

His eyes kindle when I suggest a bath before he meets with his commanders, but he shakes his head.

“Want to get this over with.  You can give me a bath when I get back.  Good way to unwind before _bed_.”  He looks at me meaningfully as I move around the room, collecting the clothes we’ve left on the floor.  I duck my head to hide a smile.

“Do you want the Dyneemal tunic for meeting with your commanders?” I ask.  The thin lines of holobroidery on the tunic will look well with the leatheren trousers.  And no matter what he has done to secure his commanders’ loyalty, I will feel better if he meets with them clothed in the Dyneemal’s protection.

The Beast nods, but his eyes still follow me intently.  “Before you go anywhere, show me somethin’.”

“What, Lord?”

“Riddick,” he growls.

“What, Lord Riddick?”

“Just.  Riddick.”  His eyes flare.  “Show me what you’re wearing under that.”  He tips his chin at my bathing robes.

He has watched me dress.  He has held me on his lap for over an hour while we worked.  He knows I wear nothing under my robes, in the Concubine tradition.

And he wants to see.

Smiling, I set the clothes I’ve collected on the edge of his desk.  Moving so that I am directly in front of him, and just out of his reach, I gather up the front of my robes, walking the loose material up my thighs with my fingers.  I feel his eyes follow the edge upwards, centimeter by centimeter, his gaze licking my skin as it is revealed.  When the skirt’s front panel is draped between my hands and my legs are exposed to the tops of my thighs, I lower my head so that my hair falls around my face and shoulders.  Keeping my head down, in the slowest and most demure manner possible, I slide the skirt up to my waist.

With my head down, I cannot see his eyes, but I can hear his breathing quicken.  From the corner of my eye, I see his hands clamp down on the armrests of his chair.

Hidden behind the veil of my hair, I smile and say softly, “Is that what you wished to see?”

“Yeah,” he says, his growl sounding strangled in his chest.

Nodding as though I have exposed nothing more interesting than a teacup, I slowly lower my robe, letting my hands fall to my thighs first, and then walking the edge of the robe back down my legs with my fingers.  By the time I’m finished, his hands on the chair are white-knuckled.

He desires me.  _How_ he desires me.

I shake back my hair just enough to see, but leave it hanging around my shoulders and face, so that my eyes are shadowed.  Only then do I steal a glance at his face.

The avid intensity there would be frightening, if I didn’t know what control he exercises over his own need.  If I didn’t understand what he wants from me.  In my own eyes, I let him see the hunger that our play has raised, steaming, in my blood.  Then I carefully gather the clothes from the edge of his desk and walk away towards my chamber, letting my hips sway, just a little, to the pounding of my pulse.

Behind me, his chair creaks.  I imagine him sinking deeper into it, letting his head fall back against the ornate backrest, closing his eyes to savor what he has seen.

When I glance back from the archway into my chamber, I see that my imagination has served me in good stead.

Out of his sight, I deposit the clothes on my bed and stand with my back pressed against the wardrobe door, my head back, my eyes closed.  I want to hold the memory of his face in my mind’s eye forever.  All that incendiary desire.  For _me_.

The wonder of it forces a tiny noise out of my throat.  I cover my mouth with one hand so that no further sound escapes, and press the other to my belly, where such a conflagration rages that it must soon consume my viscera, my blood, my bones, until nothing but this shimmering need burns within the shell of my skin.

By the time we come together, I will be a spirit of flame.  When he bites me again – and oh, how can I wait the hours between now and when he will bite me again? – he will bite through to wildfire.

The creak of his chair brings my head up, my eyes open.  I cannot remain here.  He needs to dress, and meet with his commanders, so that he can return to me . . .

 

He lingers after I have dressed him, as properly as any servant ever dressed her lord.  And yet so improperly, with my breath feathering over each centimeter of skin before I cover it, my fingers lingering on each clasp and smoothing a hundred invisible wrinkles, that his breathing has shortened to deep, audible bursts by the time I am finished.  I cannot see it, and it would violate the rules of the games we play for me to find out with a blatant touch, but somewhere deep in me, where I simmer in the furnace of my own heat, I know his tunic hides the bulge of his ardor again.

Standing together at his desk, his body pressed lightly against my back, his arms around me, he has me hold a whetstone while he sharpens each of his blades.  I am under no illusion that any of his knives need the attention we give them.  But I say nothing, smiling to myself with the knowledge that he is as loathe to go as I am to have him leave.  I fetch Hannelore when his pile of blades runs low.  When he finishes sharpening each knife, I solemnly offer him a few strands of my hair to test the edge.

After I sheathe a glinting Hannelore and set her carefully on his desk, I turn so that the fronts of our bodies are almost touching.  Feeling for the edge of the desk behind me, I lean back onto my hands.

It is a move I have seen Dame Vaako make many times while speaking with men.  And the Beast responds to the thrust of my hips and the rise of my breasts under my robe in the same manner that they did.  Only his growl of desire is audible.

His hands cup my hips and draw my lower body against his.  He does not push himself against me, but lets my body seek his out.  His control, as always, is iron and indomitable.

“ _Extremely_ hard to wait, Liaden.”

I smile as shyly as I can manage with such excitement running through my veins.  “Will you keep me waiting long?”

He growls again, husky and low, a sound that vibrates through my belly, clasped so tightly against his.  “No.”

He releases me and stalks away.  I wait until the Inner Doors close behind him before I allow my true smile, a wholly feminine smile of satisfaction and delight, to light my face.  Then I hurry to my chamber to review the Concubines’ instructions before he returns.

 

The Elemental’s precisely enunciated tones jerk me out of my fascinated study of an oral technique the Histories guarantee will drive any man, living or half dead, to orgasmic abandon.  The coordination of cheeks and throat looks difficult, and I would like to practice first but . . .

I quickly blank my lens and turn to face her.

“Forgive me, what did you say?”

“I asked if now was a time when we might speak.”

I swallow hard, wishing I could swallow the color flooding to my cheeks.  Making a mental note to tell Tiguan that all visitors should be announced in a way that _ensures_ I hear them, no matter what I happen to be doing, I say, “Of course.  What is it you want to speak to me about?”

“There is a prophecy, a foretelling, concerning the new Lord Marshal.  Are you aware of it?”

Swallowing again, to relieve the sudden dryness of my mouth, I nod.  The Elemental looks satisfied and folds her hands in front of her stomach.  Seeing her standing in the archway of my chamber, it occurs to me that I am being rude.

“This is not a comfortable place for us to speak.  Would you care to accompany me into the Lord Marshal’s chapel?”

There are padded benches there where we can sit, and where I can put a much more comfortable distance between us than my small chamber allows.

A brief expression of distaste crosses the Elemental’s face.  An unbeliever, I should have remembered.  “I am content to speak here,” she says.  “Although I would be more at ease sitting.  If I may.”  She tips her head at my bed.

Her casual invasion of my private space grates, but the Beast has accorded her the status of guest, so I have little choice but to nod.

“I sense that you are not entirely comfortable around me,” she says, settling herself on my bed.  A spectral wind swirls around her, ruffling her veils.  When it stops, she becomes so solid that her weight indents the thick, holobroidered coverlet of my bed.  Unnerving, her ability to transition from air to flesh.  No-one but the Lord Marshal should have such power.

“Not entirely, no,” I admit.

She smiles faintly.  “Honesty is a rare thing in these times.  Would it help if I said that I am here entirely as an observer?”

Not at all, since a spectral observer is hardly less unnerving than a meddling specter.  Perhaps more, since an observer’s motives are inscrutable.  “Whatever your purpose, what is it you want of me?”

“If you are aware of the prophecy concerning Riddick, then you must be aware of your part in it.  Unless you believe that it concerns some other woman.  But my calculations suggest that it does not.  Your professed plan, therefore, to observe the tradition of Necromonger concubines and end your life in order to follow your late Lord Marshal, confounds me.”

 _She_ confounds me.  She speaks Universal, words that I should understand, and yet they make absolutely no sense to me.  “What does my observation of our traditions have to do with a prophesy concerning a Furyan bringing about Lord Zhylaw’s downfall?  It seems to me that that prophecy has been fulfilled.”

“Ahhh.”  The Elemental looks down at her hands, resting on the fabric of the glittering white gown she has worn since she was captured.  Although it has seen several days of wear, it looks as fresh as if she had just put it on.  More Elemental witchery.  “I begin to see the source of our mutual confusion.  Are you aware of the _whole_ prediction?”

I shrug.  I paid little attention to the rumors of prophecy and Furyans when they first began to whirl around the court.  Each seemed more ridiculous than the last. 

Except now I know that there _are_ surviving Furyans.  One who walked among us and I counted as a friend.  Another who sits on the Throne and I will shortly count as my lover.  Revelations and circumvolutions that make my head spin.

“The first part of the prophecy,” the Elemental says, in her slow, distinct manner.  “Concerned the spread of the Necromongers under the former Lord Marshal.  A hundred worlds plunged into darkness under the heel of an unstoppable army.  An army led by a man who had made a pilgrimage to a place normal men cannot even look upon and survive.  Who had returned from that pilgrimage changed, half-alive and half something else.  A man who could only be stopped by a child of Furya.”

I nod.  This much of the prophecy, I have heard from the court’s collective wagging tongue.

“That child was Riddick.”

I nod again, this time with just a touch of impatience.  There is so much more I want to have a chance to read before the Beast returns.

“Indulge me for just a moment, and I will come to what concerns you,” the Elemental says.  I bow my head so she cannot see me grimace; I should not be so transparent.  “The second part of the prophecy relates what might happen if Riddick prevails.  The lights of the galaxy’s many worlds will grow bright again.  And the Necromongers will disappear as if they had never been.  Marched off to their promised new land by the child of Furya.  Unless . . .”

Her dramatic pause makes me lift an eyebrow warily.  “Unless?”

“Unless the Furyan becomes an even more terrible overlord than the former Lord Marshal.  A pitiless beast intent on ravaging all remaining human worlds, scourging them of life, before he leads his army to the Threshold.”

Her clever, calculating eyes watch me closely and I have to control a flinch.  Can she know what I call him in my mind?  Can she hear my thoughts?  No, I have never heard of an Elemental having such power.

I clear my throat.  “And does the prophecy say why Lord Riddick would do such a thing?  Certainly, he has no plans to continue the Campaign now except against the Galinites.”

The Elemental nods sagely.  “Vengeance.  And despair.  Over the loss of a woman.  A Necromonger woman who should have been his bride.  Who should have helped him found a new dynasty that will rule the Necromongers in this Verse and the next.”

“I fail to see how this has anything to do with me.  I am no man’s bride.”

“Prophecy is hardly a science, Liaden,” she says.  “It is an interpretation of possible future scenarios.  A slight shift in variables, and ‘bride’ could easily become one of many stations.  The critical factor, I sense, is the woman.  A Necromonger woman who can bear Riddick children.”

I go very still.  All impatience, all desire, all _life_ within me suddenly shuttered.  My heart stops beating.  My lungs stop breathing.  Only my brain continues working.  Whirling _.  How could she possibly know?_   After a long moment, I say, “I see.  And this has what to do with me?”

The Elemental smiles.  A cryptic, knowing smile that makes my heart lurch painfully back into a turgid beat.  She rises from my bed and moves in a gossamer whisper towards my lens.

“I could not help but notice what you were doing when I announced myself.”

Heat burns through my cheeks.  But I hold myself still, striving for as much dignity as is possible, sitting in my bathing robes with my hair unbound, discussing my review of fellatio techniques with this enigmatic woman.  “Yes.  And?”

“May I offer an observation?  As one woman to another?”

I grit my teeth.  “If you must.”

“A man half dead has no need of love.  But a living man?  That is a different matter.  No amount of skill can replace the one thing a living man craves.  The one thing Riddick craves.”

She knows _nothing_ about him if she thinks he wants love.  The Beast responds to heat, hunger, the needs of the flesh.  He enjoys affection, true, but the same way Tihamner and Natane do.  Beasts appreciate attention; what need have they of love?

“I see,” I repeat.

“Do you?  I don’t think you do.”  The Elemental returns to my bed and seats herself regally, as though she has every right to be there.  “It is my understanding that Necromongers do not breed.  Am I mistaken?”

“No, you are not mistaken.  Life in this Verse is the mistake.  We do not compound that mistake by adding to it,” I say, repeating the Purification Texts almost verbatim.

“And Necromongers have their bodies altered accordingly.”

Most Necromongers.  “Yes.”

“But you have not.”

 _How could she possibly know_?  It is true that I have not had the procedure.  Lord Zhylaw informed me that I would not be servicing his physical desires, so there was no need, and it would have taken me away from my duties for a day.  But I have never made that fact known.  Not even to Zhylaw.

“Whether I have or have not,” I say with the false calm of rising fury.  “It is of no moment—”

“Oh, no,” says the Elemental.  “It is of great moment.  What are the odds that the one Necromonger who has retained the ability to give Riddick a child is also the one Necromonger that Riddick would choose to take to his bed?”

“I don’t know, but—”

“I do.  They were very poor.  Until I learned of you.  Your addition to the equation has improved the odds considerably.  That is, until I heard of your plans.”

Ah, I see now.  A crafty Elemental witch.  To lead me around her parade-ground of logic like an animal with a ring through its nose.  “And so you have come to dissuade me?  Because you believe some mystical muttering that could apply to any new convert who has not yet had the procedure?”

“Riddick has not chosen any new convert.  He has chosen you.”

Her presumption infuriates me so badly that I leap to my feet.  “You have no right to come in here and spread this garbled heresy.  I am a true Servant of my Lord Marshal, and I _will_ follow him to the Threshold.  I will not shirk my duty.  Nor would I contemplate committing such a sacrilege as _breeding_!”

The Elemental looks unperturbed.  “And yet you have already committed one act of sacrilege at Riddick’s command.  If you chose to stay with him, and if he asked it of you, would you not commit another?”

“How do you know this?!  No!”

“I see.”  The Elemental rises.  “Then a hundred more worlds will fall into darkness.”

“That is the work of the Campaign!  If Lord Riddick chooses to take up the Campaign again, it is no more than the Necromonger way.”

“The way of death and despair,” the Elemental says icily.  She glides towards the archway of my chamber.  “Think on that, Liaden.  Think of Riddick on the throne with nothing but despair in his heart.  Think of him with nothing but grief to lie beside him each night.  Do you care for him so little that you would leave him to that fate?”

I hiss at her.  I cannot help it, guest though she is.  She has pushed me too far.

In the archway, she pauses and looks back at me.  “I have overstayed my welcome.  But I would ask you to think on what I have said.  Many lives turn on your choice.  Not the least of which is your own.  I hope we have the opportunity to speak again, Liaden.”

Her veils flicker, and she is gone, a whirlwind that disrupts the still air of the sanctum.  Much as her words have disrupted the deep currents of my mind.

 

_Think of Riddick on the throne with nothing but despair in his heart.  Think of him with nothing but grief to lie beside him each night._

Her words haunt me and I cannot return to my titillating study.  I pace around my small chamber.  Eight steps, the internal circumference of bed and wardrobe and lens and dressing table.  The narrow boundaries of my life.  There would be more space to pace in the sanctum, but then I would have to look at his bed and think of him lying there alone . . .

What foolishness!  He will not be there alone.  There are thousands of women in the Armada for him to choose from.  And no shortage of volunteers, if the bizarre popularity of the Concubines’ training is any indication.  He will select one of them.  Some of the new converts from Aquila or Helion will not have had the procedure yet.  Surely whatever sorcery the Elemental witch spouts refers to one of them, if there is any truth to it at all.

It could not be _me_.  I have my duty.  The duty that brought me to the Beast’s side in the first place.  The duty that puts me in his bed tonight.  The duty that demands I take the Knife tomorrow.

I am True.  I will not Fall.  I will do my duty and claim my place in the UnderVerse.  No one will deny me the reward I have worked for for so long.  The reward I have sacrificed so much for.  Not the Beast.  Not the Elemental witch and her lies.  No one.  I _will_ have the promised land, and an unLife without pain . . .

I throw myself into my dressing chair, avoiding the backrest’s tall spines out of long habit, and snatch up a brush.  The familiar sensations of its bristles against my scalp, the repetitive tugging on my hair, calm me slowly.  The Beast will not be alone tonight.  I will be beside him.  And I will do my duty so well, with such devotion, that there will be no room for despair in his heart.  I will even drive out whatever ghosts he harbors of the girl Kyra.

And tomorrow . . . tomorrow, I cannot think on yet.  Tomorrow a different duty rules me.  But tonight, tonight I have only one duty and one lord.  Tonight, my only thought will be for the Beast and his pleasure.

Resolved, I finish brushing my hair and rise.  Studying the histories has lost its allure – and I feel a flare of fury towards the Elemental for destroying that pleasure – but there is still much to be done before the Beast returns.  I need to set out the implements for the bath, remembering what I will need to tend his feet again.  And then there is the sanctum.  Lord Zhylaw preferred austerity in his chambers, but the Beast is inclined differently.  Much could be done.  A more pleasant smell, to cover the faint scent of decay that wafts from Bayle’s resting place.  Perhaps bouquets of the Calimbree roses the Beast liked, and some of the scented woods Veer and I obtained from Aquila.  A drape of fur, to keep him warmer than the thin holobroidered coverlet, and to delight his skin.  Candles would be easier on his eyes than even the dimmest artificial light.

And his skin by candlelight . . .

I stand and move towards my lens to make the necessary calls.

 

I’m so deeply engaged by my preparations, I don’t notice the first pulse of the Collar.

It is only when I feel a sharp tug, so sharp that I drop the soap I am setting next to the bath, that I realize the Collar calls.

The Beast calls . . .

I leave the soap where it has fallen and run for the Great Hall.

The slap of my bare feet on stone draws the attention of the two Elites guarding the doors of the Hall before I fly out of the stairwell towards them.  Wide-eyed at my sudden appearance, they throw open the doors and stand out of my way.

Would they stand so still if he was injured?

The thought slows me as I enter the Great Hall.  It is full of people, and none of them in the furor that they would be if the Beast was hurt.  My searching eyes find him where he sits slumped on the Throne.  I see no blood, no sign of injury.  But he looks pained, his forehead furrowed, his eyes narrowed, a tarnished silver glare moving under heavy lids.

The lights of the Hall are overbright.  No doubt they hurt his sensitive eyes.  I put my hand to my Collar and dim the lights without thinking.

My action causes every head in the Hall to lift.  The cluster of purifiers on the steps of the Throne glance around in surprise.  The small knots of courtiers malingering in the Hall’s archways and alcoves do likewise.

I realize too late that my action has done what my hasty, but unnoticed, entrance did not.  It has focused every eye in the Hall on me.

In my bathing robes.  With my feet bare and my hair unbound.  Without even a concealing layer of paler to hide beneath.

I lift my chin and gather as much dignity as I can manage before walking across the cold stone floor to the Throne.  The Beast called; he must need me.  No matter how great the humiliation of appearing so discomposed, I will not fail him.

Two purifiers stand on the step below the Throne – one immediately recognizable as Edellis from both his robes of rank and his stocky stature – the other a stranger.  They turn their backs to me and begin speaking to the Beast again.  Resuming whatever conversation I have interrupted.

The Beast watches me walk toward him, ignoring them, and a tiny smile tilts the edges of his mouth.

As he ignores the purifiers, I manage to ignore those around me, and their insidious whispering, until Dame Vaako falls into step beside me.

“This is becoming a habit, Liaden, appearing in such unusual attire.  Are you trying to start a trend?”

“I’m trying to serve the Lord Marshal,” I answer, truthfully, as the Beast would want me to.

The sinuous sway of her walk becomes more pronounced and I brace myself for the coming volley.  “Really?  In what way?  Do you plan to bathe him here?  I admit that would be more entertaining than this morning’s ceremony.  Will we be allowed to watch?”

I put my first foot on the steps of the Throne, crossing that barrier that my station allows me to cross at will, but that she cannot cross without invitation.  I should leave her behind, discounted and ignored.  But I cannot.

Under cover of gathering the skirts of my robe in my hand, I give her a cool smile and say, “Regretfully, that pleasure is mine alone.”

Her eyes blaze and I bow my head to hide my triumphant grin as I continue up the steps.

A cluster of purifiers, their attention focused on whatever unfolds on the top step between the Beast and Edellis, blocks my way.  They have all suckled the pap of Edellis’s presumption to encroach so far on the Throne.  The Beast does not know that the lesser purifiers have no right to stand on the steps, but _they_ should know better.

I hiss at them, and several glance around nervously.

“Your place is on the floor,” I say pointedly, and the purifier nearest me, an acolyte so new that his purification marks are still healing, flushes a guilty red.  He hurries down the stairs.  The others follow him more slowly, leaving only Edellis and the man I do not recognize standing on the step below the Beast.

With the lesser purifiers out of my way, I size up the situation as quickly as I can.  The Beast sits slumped on the Throne, his hands gripping the armrests, head down.  His mouth, no longer smiling, is drawn into the tightest line I’ve seen.  Under his heavy lids, his eyes move back and forth, the pendulum motion I remember from the feast.  He is listening, thinking, considering.  But not calmly.  His posture stirs a memory.  Hunting as a child along my mother’s snare lines.  Trapped predators, looking for an escape, any escape, prepared to gnaw off their own limbs in order to be free.  A Beast at bay.

There is something wrong here.  Something that threatens him.

I do not need to look at Edellis or the other purifier.  The Beast has told me, without a word, all I need to know.

I climb the remaining steps quickly.

“Forgive me,” I say, softly, but with all of the authority of my station.  “It is time for the Lord Marshal’s bath.”

Edellis turns his head slowly and his eyes scrabble over me.  He has always looked at me as though I were naked.  And it has always made my stomach churn, even when it wasn’t so painfully empty.  Even before I knew how a man should look at a woman he desires.  I am grateful for the robe’s thick bodice and long skirts.

“Liiiaayyyden,” he says, dragging out the syllables of my name in a manner that implies familiarity and intimacy where there is none.

I raise my chin and stare at him witheringly.

He recalls himself.  “You always observe the proprieties,” he says with a small shrug, as though there is nothing admirable in this.  “But they will have to wait.  We’re discussing matters of import.  Matters between men.”  He glances at the Beast like a conspirator, excluding me, the servant, the _woman_ , from the important discussions of _men_.

“Oh?” I say lightly.  “Then I will wait until the Lord Marshal is ready.”

Edellis’s eyes glitter.  He thinks he’s won.  Dismissed me.  Put me in my place.  Which would be under him, if he had his way.

I am neither so easily beaten nor so easily dismissed.

I step past him, lifting my skirts to reveal a flash of ankle and calf that I hope disconcerts him.  It is all of my bare flesh that he will ever see.  Climbing into my accustomed place on the right-hand flange of the Throne, I kneel and arrange my skirts carefully.  Then I place my hand on the armrest next to the Beast’s – an impropriety to which I know he will not object – and lean into him.

The Beast’s hand rises, brushes aside my hair, and settles around the back of my neck.  Under his fingers, the Collar pulses warmly.

Edellis clears his throat and looks at me as though I have just turned an unusual shade of green.  His eyes seem glued to the Beast’s hand on my neck.  Have I surprised him?  I hope it is the first of many unpleasant shocks.

“Liaden, these are not matters for your ears.  They are between the Purifier and the Lord Marshal.”

I bow my head as though chastened.  The Beast’s hand flexes on my neck and I feel a rush of consternation that is not my own.  The Beast’s?  He has no reason to be concerned for me.  I have swum in the court’s shark-infested waters for four years, with far less visible support and protection from the Lord Marshal than the Beast now offers me.  If there is one thing I know, it is how to handle the lecherous toad in front of me.

“Between the _purifiers_ and the Lord Marshal, of course,” I say, stealing a glance through the wisps of my hair at the man who stands beside Edellis.

Both purifiers look discomfited, by my words, as they begin to process them, and by my glance.  The hair is a useful device.  I will have to remember to use it more often, even if it means leaving my hair unbound.

“Surely you would not reveal high secrets of your office in front of an acolyte,” I add.

I can see that the purifier standing next to Edellis is no acolyte.  He wears the purple robes of rank.  But I do not know him, so he must be newly promoted.  Edellis, so proud of his power, will correct me, handing me the purifier’s name and station, which I cannot guess from his vestments.

“Enar is my second,” Edellis says.

Predictably.

“Ah.”  I lower my head again.  Second?  Edellis demoted Bialy and Cengis?  That will not sit well with either of them.  No wonder I don’t see their faces in the small flock of purifiers now gathered at the base of the Steps.  “Forgive me, Enar, and let me offer my congratulations to you.”

He will respond, and I will be able to take his measure by his response.

He puffs out his chest and bows with only his neck, as though he outranks me.  Another bloated toad of a man.  How disappointed the old Purifier would have been in his third, to see how quickly Edellis has abused his station.

“If you and your second discuss matters of great import with the Lord Marshal,” I say, leaning a little further into the Throne and the Beast’s hand.  “Perhaps it would be well to clear the Hall.  Surely these are not fit matters for the court and those of lesser rank to overhear?”

Edellis’s ears flush red.  He has been caught in a lie and he knows it.  Now he is at his most dangerous.  Humiliated.  Liable to strike back viciously.  The Beast recognizes it, too, and his thumb circles in a slow warning across the side of my neck.

I need to defuse the insult without losing whatever ground I have gained.  “But forgive me.  As you say, I have always paid too much attention to small proprieties.  I’ve interrupted your important discussion.  Please continue and take no notice of me.”

The Beast makes his low sound, so soft I can barely hear it, but I feel his approval and amusement flicker through me.

Edellis clears his throat again, a habit that has always repulsed me.  It makes me think of a bullfrog warming up before it begins to croak.  I have caught several bullfrogs in the pond in my garden and fed them to Tihamner and Natane in Edellis’s honor.

Perhaps the Beast will join me in catching a few tomorrow after breakfast.

“Very well,” Edellis says, trying and failing to project the regal dignity the old Purifier always wore like a cloak.  “We were speaking, before we were interrupted . . .”  His eyes flick to me in silent rebuke.  He has never shown me even the slightest admonition before.  But then, I have never put up a serious defense before, preferring to deflect and avoid his advances rather than to confront him head-on.  I have been too afraid, too conflicted.  But I am fearless in the defense of the man who sits on the Throne.

“Of the important matter of purification,” Edellis continues.  “As I said before, there are two centuries of Necromonger tradition to consider.  A tradition passed down from Covu himself.  It would flout two hundred years of that holy lineage for an unpurified man to sit on the Throne—”

The Beast’s disgust runs through my blood like a hot wire.  An image flashes behind my eyes.  Of a hazel-eyed girl.  With red-raw marks on the sides of her neck.  And a horrifying emptiness in her eyes.

 _Kyra_.

This is what brought me running to him.  This is why he needs me.  Edellis seeks to trap him into purification, and the Beast fears it.  Fears and hates what was done to his Kyra.

But Edellis is a bloated fool.  Who preaches Education but does not read the histories.  Who has not spent every free hour for the last four years studying the records of the Necromongers and the body of knowledge, sacred and mundane, inherited from the Austeres, and from their Earthly predecessors, the Jesuits.

The way I have.

“Is it?”  I interrupt, trying to look genuinely puzzled instead of disparaging.  “Covu was not Purified.  Nor Oltovm.  Nor Nephemil, who began the tradition of purification, of course.  Nor Baylock, the last of the Lords Marshal to be born a Necromonger.  So, in truth, only two of the six, pardon me, now seven, Lords Marshal were ever purified.”

Edellis’s mouth gapes and he turns an ugly purple that would clash with his robes, except that now he disgraces the black vestments of Purifier Principal.

“And those two have not crossed the Threshold yet,” I add helpfully, to forestall what I can see as Edellis’s next line of argument.  “But Covu, Oltovm and Baylock all crossed the Threshold without purification.”

“Are you questioning the tradition?” Enar puffs.

I bow my head and look up through my hair.  “Oh, no.  Forgive me if my question seemed impertinent.  Lord Zhylaw and the . . . former Purifier always indulged my interest in history.”  I glance at the Beast, as shyly as I can manage.  “Forgive me, if I got carried away.”

The Beast gives me a small smile.  But I can still feel the fear and loathing raging through him.  He gives no outward sign of it at all.  He is perfectly controlled.  If he wasn’t touching me, feeding me his feelings through the Collar, I would never guess at the turmoil behind that stoic façade.

“Liaden has a point,” the Beast says finally, a low rumble that I can feel building towards an inescapable conclusion Edellis will not like.  If he were smart, he would take the hint and bow out gracefully now.

But he is not smart.  He is persistent, hopping and croaking after me for two years without respite.

“Bu-but,” Edellis stammers, then recovers himself.  “Whatever the validity of these—”  He waves a hand dismissingly, a gesture he stole from the Purifier, who could wave away the strongest objection with an elegant flip of his hand.  On Edellis, the gesture looks ridiculous.  “Historical considerations, the fact of the matter is that every Necromonger living today has been purified.  Except for _you_.”

Edellis takes a step forward, level with the Throne, and glares at the Beast.

Despite the insult he has just done to the man I defend, I say nothing.  I merely tilt my head toward the Beast and wait.  Edellis has gone too far.  He has encroached on the Throne and questioned the Lord Marshal.  The Beast will dispose of him, possibly with the ammunition I have already given him, or possibly with one of the recently-whetted blades he carries.

I hope for the latter.

The Beast’s thumb rubs slowly, up and down my neck, before he responds, and I fight not to close my eyes with the pleasure that simple caress sends spiraling through me.

“Back the fuck up,” he growls.

Edellis finally realizes his presumption, and takes a hasty step backwards.

“Fact of the matter is,” the Beast says.  “I’m the Lord Marshal.  Not one of the rank and file.  An’ their rules don’t apply to me.”

“You hold yourself above the Faith?”  Enar gasps, outrage thinning his round face.

Perhaps a little more ammunition.

“The Lord Marshal _is_ the Faith,” I remind him, quoting from the Purification Texts.  “The Faith flows from the Lord Marshal to each of the Faithful.  He is the living embodiment of the Faith.  That is why he sits on the Throne.  That is why he leads us to the Threshold.  That is why we _all_ kneel before him.”

Enar turns so red I think he might ignite, while Edellis turns an even uglier shade of purple.  I pray for thrombosis.

“So other than purification,” the Beast says.  “What’d you want to talk to me about?  I’m runnin’ late.”

I bow my head and press my lips together to hide my smile.

“There is the matter of your Education,” sputters Edellis.  “You know nothing of the Faith.  How can you hope to lead the Faithful when you know nothing of our Faith?”

A question I have pondered myself, so I am curious to see how the Beast responds.

“Through strength,” the Beast says.  “Speakin’ of which, I didn’t see any of you at training this morning.  Tomorrow, you’ll be there.”

Edellis gapes at him.  “We-we do not see combat.”

“Thought every Necromonger trained for war.”

Oh, how well he uses the ammunition I have given him.

Edellis backpedals.  “Well, yes, as part of Education, but once we have been Educated and assigned to our various roles in the Armada, Purifiers do not train anymore.  We have more important matters to attend to—”

“More important than the Campaign?” the Beast asks, his voice shading into deadly sarcasm.

For someone who has not been Educated, the Beast has grasped the essentials of the Faith very quickly.

The honor guard standing along the lower steps of the Throne, and the courtiers on the floor, many of whom are minor officers, stir at the Beast’s words.

Edellis swats at the angry, rising buzz as he would an insect.  “The Faith!  The Faith is more important.  The Campaign will end – has ended now that you have ordered us to the Threshold – but the Faith endures eternal.  You cannot hope to cross the Threshold if you have not been Educated in the Faith!”

“Don’t hope to cross the Threshold at all,” the Beast murmurs, but so softly only I can hear him.  Louder, he says, “Campaign’s not over.  Still got the Galinites to take out.  An’ anyone else who gets in our way.”

“But these are minor conquests,” protests Edellis.

“Think so?  Maybe you should go along with Scales then.”

I cannot help but smile.  Scales has less tolerance for the religious aspects of the Campaign than the Beast, if that is possible.  Edellis will find himself relegated to a supply ship if he accompanies Scales.

Edellis shakes his head as though trying to shed the Beast’s arguments like water.  “I had no intention of slighting the Campaign.  Only of emphasizing the importance of Education to the Lord Marshal.”

“I’ll pick it up as I go along,” the Beast growls.  “Anything else?”

Edellis smoothes the front of his robes, fingering the silver sash that girdles his thick waist.

“The Lord Marshal is running far behind schedule,” I say helpfully.

Edellis glares at me.  His eyes focus, narrow and hate-filled, on the Beast’s hand on my neck.

“Not at the moment,” Edellis says.  He turns, without giving the Beast any obeisance, and begins walking down the steps.  Enar trails him, hopping after his master.

Two steps down, Edellis glances back at me.  “Remember my offer, Liaden.”

 _Never_.  Now that I have seen a man’s honest desire, known a passionate touch.  Never, never would I submit to his reptilian lust.  Not even to be free.

I say nothing, merely lean into the Beast’s hand and stare at Edellis from behind the shield of my hair.

The Beast waits until Edellis and his followers have swept from the Hall before he growls, “What offer?”

“It is nothing, Lord.  A fool’s offer.”

His hand flexes on my neck, and rage pours through the Collar.  “What offer?” he repeats, his voice dropping dangerously.

I twist my head so that I can look into his face.  It is taut, white-lipped, as angry as I have ever seen him.  His fear and disgust at the idea of being Purified have focused into anger.  Focused on me.  I want to answer him, to dispel his anger and his fear.  But with Dame Vaako and the other leeches so close, I dare not.

I need to get him away from them.  I need to get him alone, where I can soothe him and return him to the tender, desirous state he was in when he left me.

“This is not a fit subject for the Great Hall,” I say softly.

“Fine,” he growls.  “Let’s go.”

He releases me so suddenly that I nearly topple off my perch.  While I catch myself on the armrest, he stands and stalks down the steps, moving so quickly that I have to run after him, my bare feet pattering on the stone.

Dame Vaako’s trilling laugh follows me out of the Great Hall. 


	13. Chapter 13

He does not slow or wait for me, but when we reach the inner chamber, he whirls and roars at me, “What offer!”

I pull up short, flushed and breathless from trying to keep pace with him.  Composing myself quickly, I say, “Edellis claimed to know how to remove my Collar.”

The Beast’s eyes blaze and veins rise in his neck and forehead, throbbing so fiercely I fear for him.  I reach toward him but he pushes my hand away.  “Why don’t you ever fucking tell me anything?!”

He paces towards his desk and slams his fist down onto it so hard the great lens rattles in its metal brackets.

Wincing, I try to think of what to say to placate him.  The truth – the truth that I have to believe except in my weakest moments – is all I have to offer him.  “It is a fool’s offer, Lord, nothing more.  The Collar is grafted into my nervous system.  It cannot be removed.  No matter what Edellis claims.  No matter how much I wish it might be so.”

He makes no response, but stands over his desk, his great shoulders hunched, grinding his fist into it until I expect to hear the stone squeal.

“Edellis is a fool.  You shouldn’t let him upset you . . .”  I cast about for something to divert him.  “Wouldn’t you like your bath now?  It will relax you.”

He moves suddenly, a blur of motion that makes me draw back nervously.  But his gesture is not directed at me.  He tears the Dyneemal tunic over his head and throws it into his desk chair so hard the chair spins back a meter.

“I don’t need another fucking bath!”  He stands with his back to me, his head down, his hands clenched to fists at his sides.  “Just wanted to be left alone.”

A raging Beast.  A grieving Beast.  A Beast ready to bite any hand, even one that offers aid.

I cross the small space between us and touch his shoulders gently, tracing the heavy muscles that shake with controlled fury.  “Summon me when you need me.”

I step carefully around him and move towards my chamber.  I will not leave him alone, undefended, not when he is so angry.  But I will give him what solitude I can.  I have no door to close, but if I sit on my bed, close to the wall, he will not have to see me . . .

He catches my wrist.  “Wait.”

I turn and look at him.  His forehead is drawn into tight creases.  His shoulders and chest flex with tension.  Those beautiful silver eyes are shadowed, haunted.  Such pain.

I reach out and he drags me towards him, his arm going around my waist.  He brings me close, but not overly so, not crushing me to his chest, the way he sometimes does.  I have to take the final step to bring our bodies together.  Laying my head against his chest, I listen to his thundering heartbeat.

“You are the Lord Marshal,” I whisper.  “We are all your servants.  Edellis cannot force you to do anything that is not your will.”

A tremor runs through him and his arms tighten across my back.

“Any of that true?  What you told him.  ‘Bout the others not being Purified?”

“All of it.”  I nod, and his hand sides up my back to clench in my hair.

“Didn’t find any of that in here.”  He raps his knuckles on the blue lens beside him.

“I’ll show you where to look.  The histories are not well organized.  It took me many years of study,” I say soothingly.

“I don’t have years.”

“I’ll help you.”

“But only for one more day,” he growls, so deep it could be the crack of stone.

Since that is no more or less than the truth, I have no answer.

“Liaden—”  He shifts against me and his hand fists in my hair.  “Give me another day.”  His voice levels to a bass whisper.

I should tell him no.  I have delayed in my duty to Lord Zhylaw long enough.  I will sing the final orisons tomorrow, and then he will have been interred with all due ceremony.  There will be nothing left but for me to follow him.

But what of my duty to the man who sits on the Throne?  If he commanded me, I would have no choice.  He has not claimed me, has not completed the ritual that will give him mastery over me, but there is no denying that the Collar obeys his will.  He could force me to comply.

Instead, he _asks_ for my help.  For a short delay that does not violate any duty I have to Zhylaw.  Although the problem with Edellis is of the Beast’s own making, it goes against my grain to make him suffer for his mistake.  His admission has salved any lingering insult to my pride.  How can I refuse him?

“Yes, Lord.  I’ll help you in any way I can.”

“Start by calling me Riddick,” he grumbles.  But I can feel him soften, the tension draining out of his body.  His death-grip in my hair relents, and after a moment, he begins to stroke me.

“Wouldn’t you like your bath now?” I ask softly, looking up into his face.

He smiles, and then, looking down into my eyes, his smile turns predatory.  “Yeah.”

 

He relaxes in the warm water, stretching out his arms along the tub’s rim, leaning his head back into the padding.  Watching him, I remember sitting in that spot and letting the liquid warmth lap over my own skin.

A flicker of silver under half-closed lids and he smiles lazily, “Could get in here with me.”

“That would be improper,” I say, fighting a smile.

That elicits a grin Tihamner would be proud of.  “Even better.”

I bow my head to hide my smile.  “As the Lord commands.”  Gathering the soap and a sponge, I dip one foot into the bath, then the other.  He watches me, eyes glinting.

“Might want to take off that dress first.”

“That would be _extremely_ improper.”

“Do it anyway.”

Hiding my smile is as impossible as hiding my excitement.  He may still harbor some lingering anger, but it has not dimmed his desire.  Without setting aside the bathing implements, I flick open the side clasps on my robe and shrug out of it.  It pools across his legs in a drift of white fabric.  He fishes it out with one foot and tosses it out of the tub.

Kneeling between his legs, I keep my eyes demurely on my hands as I soak and lather the sponge.  We’ve been this close to each other naked, closer still with only the illusory barrier of my nightgown between us, but somehow it is different now.  With the air still charged with the remnants of his anger.  With the knowledge of what we will shortly do in our nakedness adding an electric tingle to the heavy atmosphere.

I have a duty to perform before I can think of his pleasure.  I forego my usual pattern of starting with the fingers of his right hand in order to pay attention to his feet first.

When I put his feet on the padded rim, he shifts obligingly.  I unwrap and discard the soaked bandages, and carefully clean each sore while I ask quietly, “What will you do about Edellis?”

“Ghost him.  Unless you got another idea.”

I clean and trim his frostbitten heel while I consider my answer.  Edellis will trip himself up, given enough time.  But it will take time.  Certainly more than one more day.  “How quickly do you want the problem resolved?”

The Beast shrugs.

“If you’re inclined to be patient,” I say, dabbing an antiseptic balm onto the healing sores and the weeping blister on his heel.  “Edellis will eventually make a significant enough mistake that you can have him executed.  Or kill him yourself.  As you prefer.”

The Beast gives me a humorless smile, and I can guess which he’d prefer.  So would I, in point of fact.  But dead is dead, either way.  I just hope it is before his Due Time.  Edellis does not deserve the UnderVerse.

“But that could take some time.”  I turn over what I’m about to say, since the Beast could take it badly and it is not an offer I relish making.  “A faster means of achieving the same end would be to bait him.  You’ve seen the way he is with me.  If I ever gave him the slightest encouragement, he’d do something treasonous, I have no doubt.  If you want me to . . .”  I trail off, letting the Beast finish my thought as he likes.

“Use you as bait,” he says flatly.

Picking up fresh bandages, I begin to wrap his feet.  “Yes, Lord.”

“What, you suddenly take him up on his offer?”  His eyes, narrowed, flick between his feet and my face.

I nod carefully, testing his mood.  Changeable, like his eyes, an ice-blue glare one moment, a blue-black shadow the next.

“Think he’d buy that now?”

“Edellis hears what he wants to hear.  Sees what he wants to see.  He always has.”

“How far’d you take it, Liaden?”  His voice drops into that abyssal rumble, and I tense, knowing to tread carefully in answer.  His anger has abated for the moment, but I have felt the depths of his rage.  Deeper and hotter than the heart of a sun.  No wonder he has such control.  To keep all that rage in check, day after day.  “Would you let him fuck you?” he asks roughly.

I pick up the sponge again and run it down his arm.  “No, I would not let him touch me.”

He catches my wrist, pulls me a fraction closer and stares into my eyes.  “Why not?”

There are many truths I could give him.  The truth of the Collar, which would kill me before any man but the Lord Marshal put his body inside mine.  The truth of the way my skin crawls when I think of Edellis’s hands on me, when I contemplate the unwholesome thoughts I can feel brewing behind his eyes.

But a different truth might bring the Beast to me.

I lean so close that my cheek almost brushes his.  “Because you are the only man who may touch me.”

He inhales sharply, and when I lean back, a small smile tilts the edges of his mouth. His eyes warm to quicksilver and I let myself relax.  That was the right truth to chose.

“Good,” he says.  Wicked amusement darkens his voice.  “An’ I don’t mind that you’ve touched yourself.”

“What?”  I gasp.  How could he possibly know?

He lets his head fall back against the padding, his smile widening to a broad grin.  “Took me a while.  But I finally figured it out.  Why you smelled so interesting.”

The fire in my belly flares, leaping to the beat of my heart.

“Next time,” he growls, not raising his head.  “I want to watch.”

The thought of him watching me makes my blood dance.  I need to dunk my head in the cold bath to cool the red rush to my cheeks. Could he truly smell my arousal?  Even after my bath?

“The Lord’s powers of perception are astonishing,” I say, recovering as best I can.

The Beast chuckles.  He reaches down and begins to stroke my thigh, alternating his palm and fingertips, sweeping from hip to knee and back again, his hand swishing through the water.  A sweet, shivery sensation, a reminder of his touch when we lay together in his bed and I misunderstood his caresses.

I understand him better now.  I know that he wants me, a hotter burning overlaying the rage that smolders eternally in his heart.  And I know that he plays with me to divert that rage.  I cannot extinguish his rage, but I can share his desire, and his enjoyment of the games we play.  If I respond playfully to this small opening, coax him back into our game, perhaps tonight can still be a time of pleasure and sharing instead of anger and recriminations.

“Can the Lord guess what I was doing that left me in such a state?” I ask softly, stoking the fire.

He lifts his head and looks at me.  “Why don’t you tell me?”

I pause for a moment to run the sponge between the broad planes of his pectorals.  He is so very beautifully formed.  “I was practicing secrets that have been passed down from concubine to concubine.”  And that is no more than the truth, since Aimi imparted them to me.

His eyes kindle.  “What kind of secrets?”

I rinse out the sponge and relather it slowly, stretching out the moment.  Leaning across him, under the guise of stretching to soap his left shoulder, I brush my breasts against his chest.  Delight shudders through me.  The Beast makes a low sound, a husky exhalation.  His ice-fire eyes track me closely as I lean back, trailing the sponge down his side.

“Secrets on how to please . . .”  I pause and let his expectation build.  “The Lord Marshal.”

The Beast’s hands clamp around my waist.  “Bath’s over.”

I laugh at his reaction, exactly the reaction I wanted.  I protest, “I haven’t seen to your legs.”

“They’ll keep,” he growls.

I lean into him and brush my cheek against his, letting my hair sweep across his chest.  “Or your organ,” I whisper.

He hesitates, and sucks his lower lip into his mouth.  “Okay, Liaden.  We’ll do this your way.”

“You are most indulgent.”  I duck my head so that I can look up at him through my hair.  The Beast reacts as before, with an upsurge of desire.  His eyes gleam; his hands tighten on my waist.  His displayed need sends a shaft of pure heat spiraling through me.

“I’m not _that_ indulgent,” he grumbles.  But he releases me and lies back, spreading his arms across the rim of the bath.

He _is_ indulgent.  When he sees me struggling to lave his left side, he twists and spreads his legs on either side of me, propping his feet up on the rim.  It is a position that leaves him wholly vulnerable, wholly exposed to me.  He makes no comment, merely leans his head back against the padding and closes his eyes.

Gazing at him, it is hard for me to breathe.  I have never seen a man so vulnerable.  Nor did I think the Beast would ever let his guard down with me to such an extent.

Careful not to abuse his trust, I sponge his legs, stroking his skin just ahead of the sponge to prepare him for each stroke.  His skin under my hand is a satin glissade, a texture finer than the best scalecloth, so thrilling to touch that I wash the same areas over and over purely to prolong the contact.

When I finish washing his legs, I set aside the sponge and dip my fingers into the gadil butter.  Working it between my hands until it is warm, I massage his legs, beginning at his ankles, rubbing and kneading until the scarred skin feels warm and pliable under my hands.  Then I continue up his calves, working my thumbs into the heavy muscles.  He groans and flexes his legs.

“More?” I ask softly.

He bumps me with his knee in response.

I continue up his legs, rubbing the butter into his golden skin, following the gleam of candlelight, digging into the tendons and muscles of his legs with my fingers and palms and knuckles.  When I reach the point where the bath envelops his thighs, he lifts his hips out of the water.

I inch forward so I can support his buttocks on my knees.  It cannot be a comfortable position, with his back arched and his legs spread so wide.  But he holds it effortlessly.  He only moves when I work the butter all the way up his thighs and sit with my hands on his hips, looking down at him in amazement.  He shifts slightly, his hips tilting, his buttocks sliding a little further up my thighs, so that he lies completely open to me.

His trust tightens my chest, and I gaze down on him, unable to breathe.

His phallus has thickened, but still lies against his stomach, not standing away from his body the way it will when it is fully engorged.  I recall this, distantly, from my review of the Concubines’ instructions.  But that fact and all others submerge in a hot wash as I take in his nakedness.  I cannot recall what I’m supposed to be doing.  I can only stare in wonder and tremulous excitement.  What will it feel like when he puts himself inside me?  Will it be different from the times I have touched myself?

“Liaden,” he says, a deep, soft rumble.  “Finish up.”

What am I doing?  Oh, yes.  I pick up the floating sponge and run it across his hips and stomach.  The heavy muscles there clench, and I expect him to move, but he remains motionless, waiting.

I slide my hand under his phallus, cupping and lifting him.  There is nothing clinical about my touch when I run the sponge over him this time, and he rolls his head against the bath’s padding in pleasure.

I lave him with the sponge, smoothing it over his glans, stroking it down his shaft, blotting gently at his sac.  He growls, an animal caress of sound, and lifts his hips to my touch.  Veins rise in his throat, and under my hands, his phallus swells.

I forget myself again, and simply stare down at him, watching as his shaft thickens, rising away from his body.  The lustrous purple color darkens.  Only when he shifts suddenly do I recall myself, and bring the sponge sweeping back over him.

He grimaces and takes the sponge away from me.  “Enough a that.”  He reaches for me, his legs wrapping around my back, feet still held carefully out of the water, and pulls me toward him.

I brace myself against his shoulders.  I could relieve him here in the warm water, but it will add another uncertain element to an already unfamiliar situation.  Everything is ready in the sanctum, and that is where I want to pleasure him.

“Your bed awaits.”

“My bed, huh?”

“A great deal awaits you there,” I whisper.

His eyes narrow, a fulminate gleam.  “Show me.”

Without warning, he heaves himself backwards out of the bath, using only the strength of his arms, unraveling his legs from around my waist to leave me kneeling in the water.  Crouching on the edge of the bath, he holds out his hand to me.

I rise, letting the water sluice down my bare legs.  I stand in the bath and let him look at me.

An impossibly deep noise.  His eyes slip over me, and the hand outstretched toward me shakes ever so slightly.  Oh, to see that tremble.  To know he aches and burns as I do.

With a smile, I let him help me out of the bath.

Taking his new robe from the warming rack, I drape it around him, letting the silk absorb the water dotting his skin.  Circling him, I smooth the robe across his shoulders, down his back.  When my hands stray to his hips, I pause until I hear his breath catch.  Then I mold the robe down over his buttocks.  His body is cast iron under my hands, hard and perfectly sculpted, as hot as the metal would be fresh from the smelting furnace.

I round his far side to see his expression.  Heavy.  Heated.  Avid.  With two fingers, I trace his lightly stubbled jaw.

“I forgot to shave you.”

He trails his fingers down my wrist, thumb following the blue vein.  He can, I have no doubt, feel the pulse that beats frantically there.  “Probably not a good idea.”

“No,” I agree.  “My hand is unsteady tonight.”

“Guess I’ll have to do without.”

“Would you like me to call another Servant to see to you?”

He chuckles.  “No.”

“Then we will have to be content with this.  Perhaps.”  I pause to wet my lips.  “There will be compensations.”

He growls, a sound of purely predatory sexual intent.  When I back away from him to lead him to the sanctum, he pursues me with his rolling, animal gait. 


	14. Chapter 14

On my way to the bed, I skirt around a hover table that has been placed at the foot of the bed during our absence, as I instructed.  I glance quickly over it to make sure Chef missed nothing.  Goblets, the wrought Cark pitcher, the chai set, a small servery of food.  Perfect.  Just as the Histories suggest for the Lord’s refreshment after his nighttime . . . exertions.

The Beast is only a step behind me when I reach the bed.  When I turn to him, his arms are already closing around me.  I stand within his embrace, gazing up at him.  His eyes have incandesced, and he is ready now.

I have thought about this moment.  Rehearsed it in my mind.  But I discard what I had planned to say, and give him a truth that I hope will bring him to me more surely than any prepared pleasantry.

“I am yours, to use as you please,” I breathe.  “But if you wait, if you will indulge me, only a little, there is more.”

His mouth tightens and his chest rises with a breath contained.  Then he nods and releases me.  I guide him to the edge of the bed, and, as he sits, reach around behind him and lift his robe, so that he can feel the new fur cover against his bare skin.  He glances down in surprise when his skin discovers the unexpected texture.  Rumbling appreciatively, he swirls his fingers through the thick, black pelt.

I pour him a goblet of Cark and kneel to offer it to him.

“Liaden—”

“Let me honor you,” I whisper, holding out the goblet.

He takes it from me but holds it aside while he draws me between his knees.  “Honor’s not what I want from you.”

“Then let me please you.”

He frowns faintly and I rise up to brush his frown away with my lips.  Nothing should distress or displease him tonight.

His arm circles my back and holds me to him, my bare breasts pressed to his chest where the robe has gaped.  Sensation licks across my skin, and my kiss melts into something hotter, more needy.  Cradling his head in my hands, I kiss his brow, the arc of his cheek, his firm jaw.  He turns his head, seeking, and finds my mouth with his.  Oh, those soft, searing kisses.

When he releases my mouth, I whisper, “If you will wait—”

“There’s more, huh?” I can hear the convergent forces, amusement and desire, in his voice.

“Yes.”

“Okay, Liaden.  Your game.”

I reach for the goblet he holds at his side, and steer it back towards his mouth.  “Just one moment.”

I slide out of his arms, off his lap, and patter quickly into my chamber for the things I have left on my bed.  The gown is one I have never worn, that I inherited from Fainche.  A lovely slip of a thing that hangs from the most delicate of straps around my neck, spreads just wide enough to cover my breasts, baring my entire back, and then falls in ripples of silver and black to my feet.  Although not the most seductive thing Fainche left me, I selected it above the others because it reminds me of his eyes.

I gather up the other things I have prepared, and hold them behind me while I return to his side.

He watches me cross the space between my chamber archway and the bed, eyes glinting ice blue in the candlelight and wholly feral, over the lip of his goblet.  When I come to rest in front of him, he reaches over and sets the goblet on the table.

“C’mere.”  He holds his huge hands out to me.

Bowing my head, I step between his spread knees.  I dip to put the pillow I carry and the bowl of gadil butter between his feet, then rise and stand before him.

He touches me slowly, without haste.  But there is urgency in the pressure of his hand on my hip.  Burning need in the fingertips he runs over the whisper of silk that covers my breasts.  And a firestorm of want in the eyes he lifts to meet mine.

I lean down to him and touch my tongue to his lips to taste the elixir lingering there.  He catches at my mouth, but releases me when I move back.  “May I continue?”

He has given me control, but we both know it is an illusion.  A gossamer thread in the weave of the game we play.  By asking, I relinquish that control, if only to see if he will give it back to me.

“For now.”

And he does, but in a way that leaves no doubt as to who is master here.

I stroke his cheeks with my fingertips, a caress he leans into, his eyes closing.  I let my fingers trail down his neck, onto the oval of hard chest exposed by his robe.  Finding the edges of his robe, I spread it slowly, down to his waist, flicking open the magnetic clasp, and draping it around his thighs.  He starts to shrug out of it, one huge shoulder emerging from the open neck, but I pull it back around him.

“It will keep you warm.”

Chuckling, he says, “Don’t think that’s gonna be a problem tonight.”

But he leaves the robe draped over his shoulders and sits quiescent, while I kneel between his knees, settling onto the pillow I have placed over the cold stone.  I dip my fingers in the gadil butter.  Then, holding his eyes, I place my hands on his knees and slide my palms up his thighs, sweeping aside the robe until I bare his groin.

Beautiful.  He is so very beautiful.  His phallus rears away from his body, curved like a scimitar.  He has darkened, thickened hugely.  Impossibly.  Aimi was not wrong.  Not at all.  I am so very grateful to her.  His size would have stunned me without her warning.  As it is, his proud beauty makes it hard to concentrate.  To remember any of the things I planned to do to him.

Recalling myself, I feather my fingers across his thighs, gilded in the candlelight, moist from his bath.  His muscles clench under my fingers, rising and flexing beneath his taut skin.  I can feel his need in the tension of his body.  The echo of it runs under my skin.  His body calls to mine, crying out for release.

I lean into him, and blow lightly on his shaft.

His thighs ripple under me, and his hands descend, one in my hair, the other cupping my shoulder.  I expect him to push my head down, to end the game and force me to relieve him.  But he exerts no pressure.  He simply strokes my hair.  When I look up at him, I find him watching me, his eyes blazing beneath heavy lids.  His face is set, his lips tight, the muscles of his jaw working.  I realize, then, what control it takes for him not to force my head down.

Meeting my eyes, he gives me a small smile.

“Is it too much?  Shall I hurry?”  I ask.

He shakes his head.  “Still your game.”

It occurs to me, then, that he will claim his turn, and a shudder of delighted anticipation runs through me.

While it is still my turn, I want to explore him, to learn the wonder of his body.  Blowing delicately on his thick head, I cup him in my hands.  With slow strokes, I discover him, the softness of his heavy sac, the firm satin of his shaft.  His body rocks very slightly to my strokes, and his breath breaks inside his chest.  But he says nothing, does nothing to hurry me.

When I can bear the anticipation no longer, I lower my head to him.  My body fits neatly against his, my elbows over his legs, my breasts pressed between his thighs, my forehead brushing his stomach.  His skin is a furnace.  His phallus sears my lips and tongue when I take his glans into my mouth.

“Liaden,” he whispers, the deepest, huskiest noise he makes, and I know I have pleased him.  Concentrating fiercely, I swirl my tongue over his thick tip, first one way and then the other, as the instructions said, tasting his skin – the unique musk and salt of him that the bath has not washed away – and the pleasant nutty residue of the gadil butter I have rubbed onto him.

His soft noises spur me, and I am the one who grows impatient.  Impatient to taste all of him, to feel his thickness fill my mouth.  Turning my head for a better angle, stretching my jaw, I push my head down on him.  Slowly.  Slowly.  It is hard to remember in my impatience, but he’s so large I’m afraid of choking if I go too quickly.  When his glans bumps the back of my throat, I remember to relax, breathe shallowly, until I can open my throat and take him in fully.

He groans, “Liaden.”

The sound of my name, each syllable deeper and more liquid than water on stone, stirs me as much as the feeling of him in my mouth.  An unquenchable ache.  I want to swallow him whole.  To devour and consume him as the need he raises devours and consumes me.

I work him in my mouth, sucking with the back of my throat, unwilling to lift my head and release any centimeter of his satin hardness.  His hand contracts in my hair.  Still not pushing, but letting me know what delight I bring him.  His stomach rises and falls rapidly against my cheek, each breath a gravel groan.

I lift my head enough to take a breath, and then suck him back into my throat.  His hips rock and his fingers dig into my shoulder.  Sweat pools where our skin meets.  A sharper, saltier taste when I suck.  Oh, his taste.

His hips rock in small pulses, and with each controlled movement, he teaches me his rhythm.  I pull him as far as I can bear into my throat on his upstroke, releasing him fractionally on the backstroke.  His groans increase, becoming a deep, constant growling.  Under my arms, his thighs clench and flex.  Against my cheek, the hard muscles of his stomach roll.  Within my mouth, his phallus swells.  His hands clutch and release me, each clutch tighter, each release farther apart.  His climax must be near.  I want to taste it, to feel his ecstasy pour down over the wildfire swirling in my belly.

I open my throat as wide as I can and pull him all the way inside me.

“Liaden!”

His entire body shudders, thighs jerking, hips thrusting forward, hands finally exerting the pressure so long contained.  I swallow to take him in, swallow again when his saline tang floods over the back of my tongue.  He pumps in and out of my mouth, and I wrap my arms around his hips to pull him ever deeper, to take him completely.

He shudders to stillness, his body relaxing.  Each breath is still a ragged gasp.  Both hands come to my head, cupping my temple and cheek, crown and nape.  He lifts me off him and I release him from my mouth with a sigh.

He coaxes my head down onto his thigh and I lie against him, my arms still circling his hips.  One hand moves in my hair, stroking it back from my temple, over and over.  His other hand slides down to rest on the back of my neck, fingers splayed across my Collar, feeding me the sparks and splinters of his euphoria.

 _Fuck, it’s been so long_ . . .

Slowly, his breathing returns to a more normal cadence.

I can feel him looking down at me.  I can guess at his expression, the intense satisfaction reflected in his silver eyes.  But I cannot look up.  My eyes are filled by his phallus, resting against his other thigh, thick despite his release and shiny from my mouth.  My fingers are as drawn to it as my eyes.  I stroke him gently, with the tips of my fingers, the backs of my knuckles, my open palm, until his breath shortens again and his phallus swells to raging life.

I lift my head to take him back into my mouth.  Relieve him, Aimi said, before he puts himself inside me, so that he will last long enough to give me pleasure, too.  But she did not mention the heady delight of taking him in my mouth.  The pleasure of having him in me this way.

His hands catch my head, stop me as I begin to lick my way up his shaft.

“My turn, Liaden.  Stand up.”

 

Shaking with anticipation, I rise and stand before him.  Although I regret that he will not let me take him in my mouth again, it is his turn to control our game.  What will he do to me?  Will he put himself inside me now?  Will he bite me again?  The thought burns through me with such sharp excitement that I shudder.

“’Fraid, Liaden?”

I shake my head.  “Can you not smell what I’m feeling?”

“Yeah, I can.”  A wicked, wicked grin.  “Here.”

He picks up the goblet of Cark and offers it to me.  Taking it, I lick my way around the rim until I find the taste of his mouth.  When I sip from the same place he did, he growls softly.

I take only a little of the tart Cark.  His taste is so exotic, so thrilling, that I do not want to wash it away completely.  I want to continue to savor it.  And Cark is strong.  I rarely drink it, and I need no artificial stimulant tonight.  _He_ is enough to make my head spin.

When I hand the goblet back to him, he dips a finger in it before setting it back on the table.  Beckoning me closer, he touches his wet finger to my gown.  Once.  Again.  Directly over each nipple.

Then he wraps his arms around my waist, pulling me tight against him, arching my back with his huge hands, and licks the wine away.

Through the silk of my gown, I can feel the sweep of his tongue, the pinching pressure as he sucks my nipple into his mouth.  His touch brushes fire along my nerves.  Clasping his head with my hands, I realize, freshly, what control he exercised when he was in my mouth.  It is everything I can do not to crush his face to my breast.  I tremble with restraint, and with the magmatic swirl of heat that flows between my breast, my belly and my core.

He releases me suddenly, so suddenly I stumble back a step and almost fall, but he catches me between his knees.  Reaching up, he captures my wrists, and lowers my hands to my sides.

He traces a finger down the strap of my gown, to where a drop of Cark stains my gown over my untasted breast.  He leaves his finger against my nipple for a moment, until it swells and hardens. Then he rubs very lightly.

“Save that for later,” he says, wicked amusement turning his voice to dark cordial, thicker and more intoxicating than the Cark.  “Turn around.”

Obediently, I turn.  But the movement, and the destructive effect of his touch on my senses, leave me unsteady.  I sway, and he steadies me, gripping me with his knees, spreading his hands against my sides from ribs to hips.  When my world stops gyrating, he slides his hands into my hair, fingertips tracing the damp tips sweeping across the small of my back.  A line of wildfire.  His fingers dip into the edge of my gown to stroke the dimple of my buttocks.

“Show me what’s under here,” he whispers.

Deprived of the sight of him, my only anchor in the dizzying whirl of my senses is his voice.  His magnificent voice.   Full of heat.  I may have sated him momentarily, but he still burns.

Reaching back, I place my hands on my bottom.  With the tips of my fingers, I walk up the fabric of my skirt.  Cool air, the heat of his gaze, tickles across the backs of my legs.  This time he is not content merely to look.  His fingertips follow the edge of my skirt up my thighs.  The delight of his touch makes my eyelids impossibly heavy, too heavy to keep open.  I close my eyes and let myself fall into the heated darkness where nothing exists but his touch, his scent, the soft sound of his breathing.

His fingers stop just below the curve of my buttocks.  Where my skirt has stopped.

I drape the fabric between my hands, and as before, slide it slowly up to my waist.

A deep growl, and his hands close on me.  One hard in my hair, massing it between his fingers, fisting at my nape and dragging my head back.  The other squeezes the roundness of my buttock.  His fingers dig in, a bruising force that makes me writhe.  His grasp gentles for a moment, sliding across my skin, stroking and shaping me.  Then he grabs my hip and pulls me backwards, into his lap.  Shoving my skirts to one side, he reaches under my thigh and lifts my leg.

“Lord?”

“Kneel,” he growls.

I shudder uncontrollably.  If he ever commanded me like that . . .

“Liaden, kneel.”

Blinded by excitement, I hastily obey, bringing my legs up on either side of his.  He pulls my hips hard against his and pushes my torso forward with a hand in the small of my back.

I steady myself, my hands on his knees, and wait breathlessly.  He will take me now.  He will put his body inside mine and fill me.  Satisfy this desperate craving.

But he does not.  With the pressure of his hand in my hair, he drags my head to one side, stretching my neck into a long arch.  His breath licks over my skin, and then the wetter brush of his mouth, and finally, oh, finally, the sharp edge of his teeth.

I jolt in his lap and cry out.  His arm snakes around my waist, pinning me against him, holding me motionless while he bites his way from the top of my neck down to my shoulder.  Each bite is a little harder, pushes a little further along the billowy edge between pleasure and pain.  Each time his teeth sink into me the sensation is sharper, more acute, bringing my deadened nerves back to life.  The onslaught becomes unbearable, pain and pleasure rippling through me.  I cry out with each bite, and he growls against my skin in answer, a frission of heat and sound that burns along my nerves to ignite my heated core.

With each sensation magnified a thousand, thousand times, the slide of his hand across my waist is an atomic flare.  The grip he takes on my hip burns through flesh and muscle to set fire to my very marrow.  He pushes me forward, rocking me onto my hands.  Under me, his hips shift.  Another bite rockets through me.  And he pulls me back down onto his phallus.

I scream.  I have waited and wanted and wondered, but nothing prepares me for the slide of his flesh into mine.  For his sudden, thick incursion.  For the wet clutch of my body around his.

He probes me, his crown pushing into aching, yielding flesh, and then withdrawing.  Probing and withdrawing.  Over and over until I shudder and shake and try to push myself down onto him to end this torture and have him fill my body the way he filled my mouth.  But he will have none of it.  He is master here.  He holds me immobile with his hand on my hip and in my hair and his teeth in my shoulder, holding me the way Tihamner holds Natane when they mate and this must be what she feels, this hot invasion that pushes slowly in and out, this desperation to be filled and completed and satisfied.  And I scream as I have heard her scream, with fierce desire and demand, but he will not give me what I need.  He holds me, tortures me with the promise of his body, and then denies me.  Again and again.  While I pant and shake and scream.

A deeper probing silences me.  I gulp down a breath, hold it tight in my chest, trembling, praying.  Pressure and fullness as more of his length slides into me.  Not enough.  Oh, it is not enough.  I quake around him.  My thighs shake with restrained energy, with my frantic need to ram myself down on him that he prevents effortlessly with his massive hand on my hip.  I clench at his knees, my fingernails digging in.  “Please,” I whisper.

His chest vibrates against my back with the depth of his growl.  “Please what?”

“Please take me.  Please . . . please.”

His hand contracts on my hip, and he rocks me back against him.  A firestorm of sensation.  Fullness and pressure and stretching.  And then he begins to withdraw again, despite the frenzied clutch of my body.

“No!  No, please . . .”

“Yes,” he growls.  A hard, sudden surge and he pushes through one barrier, burying himself, until he bumps against a deeper closure.  I gasp with his complete possession.  A brief, uncomfortable burning makes me twist against his hands.  He holds me still, wrapping his arm around me, his huge hand closing on my breast.  Then his hips roll under me, and I cry out with the deep movement.  The unrestrained surge at my core.  He tugs my head back, the hard pressure of his hand in my hair reawakening that undulating dance of pain and delight.  His mouth closes on my neck, just under my jaw, a ferocious bite that echoes the ferocious thrust and withdrawal of him deep inside me.  The delicious savagery of it makes me scream, makes me clutch at him with my hands and thighs and innermost muscles.  My response breaks some barrier in him, redoubles the force of his movement inside me.  It becomes an unrelenting pounding that overwhelms all other sensation.  I scream to let out some of the mounting pressure, but there is no outlet.  It builds and builds and builds with each thrust until I am thrashing mindlessly, held in place only by his relentless grip.  And still it is not enough.  I scrabble at him, desperate for release, desperate for the overpowering sensations to continue.  This spiraling need cannot continue, but I will shatter into a thousand pieces if it ends.  I pull at him with hands and deep muscles, with my pleas, my voice breaking as I beg.

He roars my name into my throat, his teeth tearing my skin, sending fire whirling along my nerves, tightening my entire body.  He slams me down on him, once, again, ramming up with his hips to impale me so deeply I must split open, must release the ungovernable wildfire of his sex.

Then he slows and I scream because I am still unsatisfied, my body still yearning, still clamoring for release.  I claw at him, my fingernails riving the skin of his thighs.  He releases my breast and catches my wrists in his massive hand.

“Hellhound,” he growls.

Sobbing, I twist, trying to free my wrists, trying to drive myself down onto him in the vain hope that I can somehow bring myself to completion.

“Liaden, stop.”  He chuckles, breathy and broken.  “I’m not through with you yet.”

That quiets me.  His tone promises release even if his words do not.  When I stop struggling, he releases my wrists, putting both arms around me and holding me tight to his chest.  He rocks his hips under me, moving in small pulses that keep my insides fluttering, flaring.  His hand drifts down to rest on my belly, and he presses gently, more firmly when I gasp at the sensation that ricochets through my core.

An amused growl.  “Yeah, that’s it.”

He lifts me off him suddenly, and I cry out at the abrupt emptiness of my body.  My thighs shake from kneeling in his lap for so long.  How will I stand?  But he does not ask that of me.  He tumbles me off his lap onto the bed.  His big hands move over me, arranging me on my back, tugging and shifting me until I lie with my hips at the edge of bed.  He pushes my skirts up to my waist.  With one huge hand under my hips, he lifts me and slides a pillow under my buttocks.

“Knees up.”

I struggle to obey, but my legs are so weak from kneeling I can barely move them.  Chuckling, he does it for me, hooking his fingers behind my knees, lifting my legs.  He positions my feet on the pillow, heels hard against the backs of my thighs.

Realizing that he intends to take me this way, I relax back onto the bed.  The fur cover under me is a silken caress along my back and arms.  My hair spreads across it, long black strands mingling with short black ones.  It all feels the same to my skin.  So soft.  So sensuous.  No wonder he takes such delight in touching my hair.  My eyes drift closed.

“Lift your head, Liaden,” he whispers.  “Look.”

His words drag my gaze back to him.  He stands over me, his hands on my knees.  He has shed his robe and his powerful chest and shoulders glint in the candlelight.  His eyes gleam with a light of their own.

I strain my neck to comply.  With a smile, he pushes another pillow under my head.  Then his hands return to my knees.

“Saved this for last,” he says, his voice as soft and dark as the fur under me.  His thumbs exert the faintest of pressures on the insides of my knees.  “Now show me.”

I shiver violently.  He has already possessed me, and he still wants to see . . . His depthless desire reignites my own.  Burning in the cauldron of our shared heat, I slowly part my thighs.

He groans, a sound torn from deep in his chest.  His hands sweep down, fingers digging into the long muscles of my thighs, beginning again the dance of pleasure and pain.  His thumbs rub into the soft curve between my inner thighs and mound, a touch that sends expectant shivers through me.

“Beautiful, Liaden,” he whispers.

His fingers feather over the bare skin of my mound.  Stroking me, each stroke a slow eternity, he discovers the swollen, wet membranes within.  I choke at each touch, the air in my lungs too thick to exhale.

“See me touchin’ you?”

My eyes roll back in my head in delirium.  I try to focus, to watch as he has commanded, but the pleasure of his touch, the fire his deep voice stirs in me, render it impossible.

His fingers spread, spanning me, working around my shaking thighs to grasp my buttocks.  He lifts my hips off the bed, gripping me tight in his palms.  His forearms push between my thighs and calves, until my knees rest in the crooks of his elbows, and he supports the entire weight of my lower body.

“Perfect,” he growls.

A slide of heat and hardness against me, and then he is pushing inside me again.  The same slow, probing motion.  He rolls his hips, circling his glans inside me, stimulating the enflamed tissues around my opening.  I gasp and flail, my hands scrabbling across the fur for some handhold, some grip on sanity as he begins a fresh assault on my senses.

“Hold on to my wrists.”  He shifts his grip very slightly, so I can grasp his wrists.  “And look at me, Liaden.”

I choke on a cry.  It is too much, too intense, to watch as he begins to move in me.  To see the slow, coordinated rolling of his shoulders and arms, chest and stomach that drives him in, in, in and then back out.  Never completely withdrawing.  Sinking that massive hardness into me further and further with each stroke.

A faint burning as he passes that broken barrier in my body has me twisting again in his hands.  But he holds me as tightly as before, and the discomfort submerges under stroke after stroke of mounting rapture.  The gathering power behind each thrust calls to an answering strength of my own.  A strength that has me clamping down on his wrists, wrapping my calves around his back.  A strength that arches my back and lifts my hips in his hands, matching his crescendoing rhythm.

“Yes, Liaden.  That’s it.”  His hands contract on my buttocks, pulling me to him harder and faster.  “Look at me.”

I fixate on the only still point in the storm of sensation.  His glowing quicksilver eyes.  I watch the pleasure build there, matching the building, trembling delight within my own body.

And then sight, sanity, everything else is ripped away.  Pleasure so acute it dances in and out of agony surges through me, sizzling along my nerve endings, exploding up my spine.  The Collar pulses with it and combusts, a black fire that lights the entire room with its unlight.  And his rapture fills me.  The sharp, ecstatic explosions that arch his back, tear my name from his throat, drive him into me in a climactic frenzy.  I lose all sense of where I end and he begins, there is only a fusion of flesh and blood and bone that convulses in and around itself, burning and burning in the black fire that does not burn but flows around us on the waves and ebbs of our shared climax, finally subsiding only when he pushes me across the bed and climbs on top of me, wrapping me in his arms and legs and skin, pulling the fur coverlet around us.

I drop into an exhausted slumber. 


	15. Chapter 15

I rise slowly back to consciousness.  The unfamiliarity of being held so close to another warm, breathing body wakes me.  My body feels heavy, so languorous that I can’t even open my eyes.  The last moments before I fell asleep replay in the blackness behind my eyelids.  My own release, the Beast’s magnificent climax, and the black fire of the Collar playing around both of us.  Am I remembering truly?  Did the Collar really ignite?  I must have imagined it.  The Collar unleashed black fire when Kryll claimed Maja.  Maja was able to call and shape it afterwards in the defense of her Lord.

But Kryll _claimed_ her, with the proper rituals and positions and purification.  And Kryll was a true Lord Marshal, ordained by Baylock when Baylock crossed the Threshold and rose again in the UnderVerse.  The Beast is not even Purified.  How could he have called the Collar’s fire?

I lie in the circle of his arms, pressed tightly against him, pondering, until his breathing, warm in my hair, deep and even, lulls me back to sleep.

Movement wakes me from a drifting doze.  His fingers trace slow spirals on my shoulder and hip.  He tugs at the fragile strap of my gown, still around my neck, then on the skirts wound around my waist.  His hold on me slackens just enough for me to wriggle out of the gown.  Then he wraps me back into that full-body embrace, his skin enveloping me.  His breathing deepens again.  What awakened him?  The touch of fabric instead of skin?  Could he, like me, be unused to sleeping beside another?  Do my small motions disturb him?  Does my breathing soothe him?

I could draw away from him – if he would relinquish his death-grip on me – so that we might both fall into a deeper sleep.  But there is such comfort in being held like this.  Such tenderness in the way he touches me, sleepy and satiated.  I do not want to move away, even if the only sleep I get all night is this broken doze.

Sighing at the strange sweetness of his embrace, I shift, pushing him onto his back so I can rest my head on his shoulder.  The Beast grumbles, rearranging his hold on me, hands going to my waist and hair.  But he holds me no less tightly, no less comfortingly.  With his warmth beating through me, as slow and soothing as the beat of the great heart under my hand, I drift.

His body flexes suddenly under mine, the final muscular spasm before sleep.  I recognize it from many similar jolts of my own, lying alone in my cold bed.  Smiling, I nuzzle his shoulder and close my eyes.

“Kyra—”

My eyes snap open.

He calls for her after what we have just done?  After the pleasure and release I have given him?

Incensed, I rise onto my elbow and hiss, “I am Liaden.  Liaden who lies with you.  Liaden who holds you—”

He chuckles sleepily, without opening his eyes.  “I know who you are, Liaden.”  He strokes my head back onto his shoulder, despite my rigid resistance.  “It was just a bad dream.”

A bad dream?

I let him press my body back against his side.  “You dreamed of her last night,” I say softly, giving him an opening if he wants to talk, to share what haunts him.

“Did I?”  He yawns.  “Mmm.”

Perhaps he needs more of an opening.  “You called for her.  You asked if she was with you.”

He strokes my hair in sleep-thick silence for a moment.  Then he says, low and soft, barely audible, “Asked if _you_ were with me.”

My eyes fly over his face: restful, composed, his eyes closed.  It tells me nothing.  “I thought you were asleep.”

“Half-a-lifetime in slam or on the run – makes you a light sleeper.”  He stretches, arching his back, his long legs.  When he relaxes back into the mattress, he crushes me even more tightly against his body.  Locked against him, infused with his warmth and sweat and smell, I cannot tell where my skin ends and his begins.

“Get some sleep, Liaden,” he whispers.  “I’ll wake you up when I’m ready to go again.”

Surely not.  I have seen his reserves of strength and stamina, but he cannot want more tonight . . .  “Lord?”

“Riddick,” he growls.

“Lord Riddick, surely I did not hear you—”

His low, amused chuckle.  “You heard me.  Get some sleep.”

Obediently, I close my eyes.  But a dark thrill sears through me at the thought of being possessed by him again, the thought that he desires me so much, when his body must be as wasted as mine, that he cannot wait more than a few hours.  Those thoughts, and the stirring in my blood that accompanies them, keep me awake for long moments after his breathing turns soft and even.

 

The Collar wakes me, a piercing jab of cold.  The touch of the Dead.  So different from the warmth of the Beast’s body against mine.  It frosts my heart.  Gasping, I struggle up onto my elbows, hampered by the weight of the Beast’s arm around my waist.  Why have the Dead awoken me?

I catch the faintest of whispers, barely loud enough to be heard over the Beast’s disturbed breathing as he rouses from deep sleep.

I strain, listening.  The Collar would not have woken me unless the Lord Marshal was in terrible danger . . .

And I hear it again, a faint whisper from the direction of the outer chamber.  Outside the sealed and soundproofed Inner Doors, there must be great shouting.

 _Within_ the outer chamber.

The sound galvanizes me out of bed, throwing off the Beast’s arm as I hurl myself towards the archway to my chamber, ignoring the Beast’s sleepy rumble of “Li?” behind me.

My weapons, the nightshade darts, the deathshead pins, the Rift, my beautiful new dagger . . . all useless unless I can reach them in time.  Why didn’t I encase the Beast’s bed in blades?  Why didn’t I order Vinay to stud the headboard with knives instead of jewels?

Inside my chamber, in the dark and moving from memory, I snatch up the nearest weapons.  A pair of pins, protruding from their holder on my dressing table like pins from a pincushion.  Only twelve centimeters long and without any edge except their sharp points, they are weapons for close fighting.  I will have to engage the attackers, put my body between them and the man I defend.  But in the dark, I will have little chance with the darts.

Hannelore.  Where is Hannelore?  I cast about for her with my mind, seeking that siren’s song.  She trills, her voice sweetened by the expectation of bloodshed.  Behind me.  On the Beast’s desk.  Careless!  How could I have been so careless as to leave her there?  And now she’s out of reach, leaving me with only . . .

The Rift.

I pat across my dressing table, feeling for the bejeweled clasp.  In my distraction last night, I must have put it down carelessly.  I cannot feel it anywhere . . .

A great crash has me spinning, diving back through the doorway and concealing myself behind the bed’s black hangings.  They will expect to find the Beast, but unless a Servant of the Chamber has betrayed us, they will not know whether or where they will find me.  I still have the element of surprise.

The Inner Doors are thrown wide.  They must have used a pulse weapon, since only three hand-prints will open those doors – Tiguan’s, the Beast’s and mine – and I cannot believe that Tiguan has betrayed us.  Bright lights stab through the darkness of the sanctum.  Beyond the glare of those actinic lights, I can only see indistinct figures.  But I count four.  Four.  And I have only two pins.

A roar tells me that the lights have found the Beast, blinding those sensitive silver eyes.  The sound comes from my left, the other side of the bed, obscured from where I’m standing by the bed’s carved headboard and drapery.  I cannot see him.

A man’s voice.  “Mahdis, hold the light on him.”

They know.  They know his weakness.  A weakness I handed to the entire court by walking into the Great Hall and dimming the lights when I saw him squinting.  How could I have been so careless?

Peering into the lights is painful, and ruins my night vision, but I have to locate the Beast.  Have to know where he is so I can put myself between him and his attackers, to give him time to escape if the fight goes badly.

Escape.  I never told him about the secret passageway through Bayle’s resting place.  He believes we are trapped.

I have failed him thrice.  By leaving my weapons in my own chamber.  By betraying the weakness of his eyes.  By failing to tell him about the sanctum’s secrets.  How could I have failed him so miserably?

Determined not to fail again, I step out from behind the drapery.

Two of the spotlights immediately focus on me.  The intensity of the lights makes my eyes water, but I hold my eyes wide, forcing my pupils to dilate, and take a step forward.

“Liaden!”

Edellis’s voice, a shocked hiss.

I should be surprised to find him here, part of this group of traitors and assassins.  But I am not.  Greedy, arrogant lecher.  Reminding me of his offer to drive a wedge between me and the man I protect.  To deprive the Lord Marshal of his right hand.  His last, best line of defense.  I should have seen his plans coiling serpentine behind his eyes.  I should have expected this.  Traitor.  Monster.  Hatred burns through me brighter than the evil light he carries.

Wrapping my arms around my waist, as though greatly ashamed of my nakedness, I take a step towards his voice.  I am not ashamed.  My body is a weapon, like any other.  But the movement conceals the pins, held flat against my wrists.  They are cold in my palms, against my sides.  The cold of the Void.

I take another step forward, and another.  I can make out four men.  All wear blindingly bright spotlights on their chests.  Three of the spotlights are trained on me now.  I cannot see their faces behind the lights, but I can see clothing.  Two purifiers.  Edellis and the purple-robed man to his right.  To Edellis’s left, a soldier, a legionnaire, from his unadorned greaves and boots.  Not one of the Elite.  Easier to kill.  The fourth man, with his spotlight still trained on the other side of the bed, wears black robes that tell me nothing about who he is.  But he stands a step behind the soldier, so perhaps he is the least of the assassins.

“Edellis,” I say, bowing my head a little so that my hair fans around my shoulders, in an attitude of deepest shame and contrition.

I can feel them staring at my nakedness.  The glare of their lights turns my skin to glowing pearl.  It washes out the lighter marks on my breasts and hips.  But the heavier marks, the bites on my breast and neck, and the blood that has dried on my inner thighs, stand out in dark relief.  I hear the soldier take a hissing breath.

Let them be stunned.  Let them be consumed by my nakedness, by the marks on my body.  Let them be transfixed while I move closer and closer.  Two meters, no more.  The pins are balanced for throwing, but they should penetrate deeply, taste heart’s blood, if possible, before their true killing power will take effect.  With the blinding light, I cannot be sure of my aim.  Better to press my small advantage, move as close as I can, and try for a throat or face wound.

“Liaden, cover yourself!”

“Oh, Edellis,” I cry, twisting the shame of my triple failure into a wrenching sob designed to convince the men in front of me that I have been taken against my will.  Forced.  Ravaged.

Let them see me as a victim.  Were my eyes not already tearing, I could not carry the pretense.  But Edellis, hearing what he wants to hear and seeing what he wants to see, as he always has, believes.  With a strangled curse, he strides forward, grabs a handful of the tangled bedding and yanks it off the bed.  He holds out the black sheet as though he would wrap it around my shoulders.

Bringing himself within arm’s reach.

Lifting my head and forcing my features into the best simulacrum of pleading gratitude that I can muster, I turn slightly.  I lift my hands towards my shoulders, keeping the Pins carefully concealed against my wrists, as though to accept the edges of the sheet.

Edellis shakes the sheet, snapping it in the air the way he would a cloak, before whirling it around me.  He is a priest, not a warrior, and he thinks like a priest, not a warrior.  His motion conceals me from the sight of the men around him as I take a last step forward and drive the pin into his throat.

Bellowing in surprise, Edellis staggers back.  Blood splashes my face and chest as I draw away, leaving the pin sunk deep in his neck.  A good wound, to the big artery.  Maybe a killing wound, even without the pin’s power.

The other purifier is closest to me, just out of arm’s reach.  But the soldier starts forward, to investigate what has happened to Edellis, making him the biggest threat.

With my free hand, I grab the sheet and hurl it at the soldier.  Cursing, he throws up his arms to try to ward off the enveloping pane of darkness.

Pivoting to give myself momentum, whirling so that my hair becomes a weapon in itself, striking the purifier in the face and making him duck to protect his eyes, I drive the remaining pin, two-handed, into his chest.

He howls and grabs at me, but I dodge his flailing arms, dive past the soldier and scramble on hands and knees to the Beast’s desk. Beyond the glare of the lights, I’m blinded again.  Hannelore.  My hands pat frantically across the cold, slick surface of the desk.  Where is she?

Her sweet call fills my mind, and my hand closes on her, just as a shriek behind me turns me back to face the assassins.

Edellis, first wounded, is the first to scream as the pin’s arcane powers take effect.  The soldier, battling his way free of the sheet, trains his spotlight on Edellis.

Black mist, thick as ash and shaped like the man it rises from, swirls around Edellis.  Where the throat of the misty form should be, a great black vortex whirls and circles, sucking the mist into its center.  Howling, Edellis claws at his throat, and the mist-form echoes his movement.  But his vaporous hands are sucked into the vortex, one at a time, and then his wraithly face.

Edellis shudders once, and collapses face-first onto the floor.

May his soul scream forever in the darkness of the Void.

The second purifier, Enar, I can see now, begins to scream, and the two other spotlights dance crazily across the floor towards him.  He’s clawing at his chest, trying to dislodge the pin.  But the soul-mist is already rising.  Too late.

A pulse blast carves a blue hole in the darkness.  It is a wild shot that reverberates against the sanctum’s shielded walls.  But it does fresh damage to my eyes, filling them with blue spots and flashes.  I see the spotlights jerk and flail, but catch no more than disjointed glimpses.  A flash of golden skin.  A stranger’s face, eyes wide with terror, under a black cowl.  A hasty swipe of a war axe that misses and clatters with the spine-ruffling clangor of metal on stone, to the floor.

The spotlights wink out.  The darkness blinds me as effectively as the earlier lights.  I crouch near the desk, stretching my senses, straining my eyes wide to regain my night vision.  I hear breathing, harsh and hurried.  My own.  And louder, deeper, from a bigger chest, a more capacious set of lungs.

“Lord?” I whisper.

“Turn on the lights.”

I bring them on dimly, since his eyes must still ache from the ferocious spotlights.  Blinking, I straighten, and nearly bump into the Beast’s broad chest.

He holds me away from him with one hand.  With the other, he wipes blood from my cheek.  He stares at me intently, silver eyes piercing below a pair of strange black goggles.

“It’s not mine,” I say.

His hands continue moving over me, down my arms, as though he doesn’t believe me, and needs the reassurance of touch.  Then he envelops me in those massive arms, holding me tighter and tighter, until I’m crushed against his chest.

I put my arms around him, Hannelore still gripped in my fist and held flat against his back.  But I cannot relax.

“There may be others,” I whisper.

His head comes up briefly, and I feel him tense.  Then he sinks his hand into my hair and pushes my face against his neck.  His mouth moves in my hair.  “One.  He’s down.”

I nod.  The killing calm that possessed me during the fight ebbs away.  I hold on to him while I shake.  The after-effects of adrenaline shudder through me in uncontrollable waves.  His big hand moves up and down my back, over the metal imbedded in my spine.  Soothing and comforting.  The warmth of his body beats back the cold that seems to expand from my core.

“S’okay, Liaden,” he rumbles.

And I believe him.  But still I cannot relax.

“I will – I will call other Servants, Lord—”

There is so much to do.  Remove the bodies.  Secure the chamber and reset the wards.  Scrub the floor.  So many decisions to make.  What will be done with the bodies.  Who must be told.

“Give it a minute, Liaden,” he says.

So I do, pushing away the details that crowd my brain.  I focus on sensations: the warmth of him, the strength of the arms around me, the safety of being held so close, the security of skin, until my shaking stops and my breathing calms.

He strokes my hair a final time and releases me.

 

By the time I call the Servants, we are decently robed. 

I have pressed the cloths and fingerbowl that Chef provided into a different service, and the Beast and I are as clean as we can get without a bath.  The Beast watches closely, his eyes gleaming, when I lave my hymenal blood off his groin and then clean my own thighs.  When I move away to pile the bloody cloths into a heap on the corner of the hover table, he growls, the same husky growl he makes when he takes me, and I wonder if I will need to tell the Servants to wait.  The bodies and blood on the floor do not seem to bother him.  He steps over and around them, but does not give them more than a passing glance, even when I retrieve my pins.  Perhaps the bloodshed has excited him.

But he makes no move towards the bed, so I lay out Cark and the serveries of food on his desk to occupy him while the Servants clean the chamber.  He gives me a wry smile before he sits down to eat.

When the Servants arrive, he glances up, but continues eating with the single-mindedness and economy of movement I have seen from him before.  He is so wholly focused.  He would not have made the mistakes I made leading up to the assassination attempt.  Grimly, while the Servants begin removing the bodies, I girdle my robe with Hannelore’s belt and sheath.  I will not be without her again.

When I move to the outer chamber, the Beast rises and follows me.  He surveys the carnage in the outer chamber quickly.  I see his eyes light on a blood-trail, where one of the assassins dragged himself a short distance before collapsing. He nods once, confirming what he somehow knew.  Even after the frenzy of battle and those blinding lights, he knew that there was only one survivor of the fight in the outer chamber, and that he posed no further threat.

Then he ignores the assassins and moves to stand next to me, his hand on my shoulder, while I pray for Tiguan.  The giant has taken so many hits from a pulse weapon that his armor is melted to his chest.  A hit to the face finally brought him down, but not before he took five assassins with him.  And not before he set off the chamber’s wards, giving me enough warning that the remaining four did not catch us asleep and unarmed.

I rise and stand next to the Beast while the Servants remove the bodies.  When one of them stoops to pick up a pulse weapon dropped by a fallen assassin, something nudges the back of my mind.  I beckon to the Servant.

“Lady?”

“Give that to the Lord Marshal.”

The Beast looks at me as he accepts the weapon.  He hides his confusion better than the Servant, but I sense it all the same.

“A word with you, Lord?”

The Beast nods and follows me through the Inner Doors.  “What’s wrong?”

“There are more to this conspiracy than the nine here.”

The Beast glances down at the weapon and frowns.  “How’d you know that?”

“Because none of the fallen are Master Armorer Varkony or any of his apprentices.  And the assassins could not have gotten pulse weapons without their help.”

The Beast’s mouth tightens and he turns the rifle over in his hands.  “Coulda jumped a guard.”

“Within the Basilica, weapons are specially issued to each guard.”  I point to a glowing blue panel on the gun’s grip.  “This is a biometric key.  The weapon won’t fire in anyone else’s hands.”

The Beast nods approvingly.  “So we got another conspirator.”

“If you call a lensor, I can find out who it is.”

“How’s that?”

“The armorers have unique codes to key the weapons.  If we port a lensor to that gun, the armorer’s code will display.”

The Beast grins suddenly, a feral baring of teeth.  “Liaden, you really are a font of information.”

 

The Beast edges away from the lensor, moving around his desk, feigning a sudden interest in his weapons belt.  His skittishness in the presence of the lensor makes me smile.

His sensitive eyes.  His rough, earnest passion.  His tenderness during the aftermath.  His discomfort around the lensor.  They make him appealingly human.

Still smiling to myself, I plug the lensor’s umbilicus into the port in the gun’s grip.

A short datalist scrolls down the hand-held screen attached to the lensor’s back.  When the weapon was activated.  How many rounds fired.  And who keyed it.

I hold out the display.  He does not need to decipher the code.  Varkony’s name appears beside it.

He stares down at the knives under his hands.  His lips tighten, a sign, I’m coming to recognize, of dark thoughts.  While he deliberates, I unplug the lensor and dismiss it.

When I turn back to him, he has removed Manoj and Marened and holds them before him.  His eyes rove the blue-chased blades.  I do not need him to make any further outward sign to know that the thoughts moving behind those lucent eyes are murderous.

“Killing Varkony will make a point,” I say slowly, gauging his reaction to each word so that if he takes my suggestion badly, I can stop before I offend him.  “But having him executed in the manner of a traitor will make a bigger one.”

“I do my own killing.”

A strangely honorable Beast.

“We are a people who value spectacle,” I remind him.  “And it is a greater reminder of the Lord Marshal’s power to see traitorous blood spill, to hear the dying screams, than to merely hear of it second-hand.”

He grins, a somewhat less feral gesture than previously.  Amusement slides through his shining eyes.  “Liaden, you got a real bloodthirsty streak.”

“I, Lord?”  I widen my eyes, a far more convincing display of innocence than Dame Vaako’s.

He grunts, unconvinced.  “All right, we do this your way.”  He passes a hand over the great blue lens.  “Basilica Guard.”

When the night guard answers, the Beast says, “Arrest Master Armorer Varkony.”

“Yes, my Lord,” the night guard, an Elite, well-trained, answers at once.  “Shall I bring him before you now, Lord?”

The Beast looks up at me.  “No.  Hold him until morning.”

“Yes, Lord.  At once.”

The Beast blanks the lens with another pass of his hand.  He continues to stare at me, and his expression becomes one of such obvious carnal intent that I take a step backwards.  But I am not afraid.  Anything but.  My skin tingles; excitement rushes hot and electric through my blood.

“Yes?”

“Bed.  Now.”

He rises from the desk, each movement the slow rolling stalk of a predator, of massive strength and speed held tightly in check until it is needed.  It is only too obvious that I am his prey.  But instead of frightening me, it’s exhilarating.  I can’t help but giggle as I back towards the bed.

“You’re scaring me,” I say, to tease and tantalize.  He will know it’s not the truth.  He can smell the way his desire excites me.

“Yeah?  You don’t look very frightened.”

The bed bumps against my back.  Trapped.  He prowls steadily towards me, and my laughter turns breathy.  Reaching me, he stares down at me, silver eyes aflame.  His hands rise from his sides, fingertips trailing along my hips, until he reaches my waist, unbuckling Hannelore’s belt and opening my robe.  He parts the robe, baring my breasts and stomach and thighs, but does not push it off me.

He tosses Hannelore onto my pillow, then stands and stares down at my skin, framed by the black robe.  “Mine,” he growls.

I cannot dispute it.  The marks of his claiming stand out in red relief against my pale skin.  I can smell him, his musky, animal scent, rising not only off his own skin but also off mine.  He is all over me.  And soon he will be inside me.  I cannot dispute that, either.  I do not want to.

He reaches under my robe, grasps my buttocks firmly in those huge hands, and lifts me onto the bed. 


	16. Chapter 16

It is my turn, but I do not argue when he arranges me to his satisfaction, with my head in his lap and my hair spread over his thighs.  He strokes my hair over and over, tugging sensuously on my scalp.  With each stroke, he rubs the long strands up and down his phallus, a susurrus of motion over his taut, silken skin.

His other hand covers mine, his fingers spread, one on top of each of my digits, while my hand moves slowly between my thighs.

“Keep your feet together, Liaden,” he rumbles.

I choke back a cry and struggle to bring the soles of my feet back in contact with one another.  He has commanded me to hold this position until he releases me, lying on my back with my knees spread, my feet together, while I touch myself the way I did in the bath.  While he follows each of my movements with his fingers.  While he watches me with his rapacious eyes.  Such dark excitement courses through me that I tremble, violently and constantly, making it impossible to hold the position he has ordered me into.  As impossible as the other demands he has put on me.  And as impossible to disobey.

He shifts his fingers so they slip down between mine and his middle finger rubs along the swollen oblong of my clitoris.  He ordered me not to touch that part of myself, to save it until last, to prolong this pleasurable, aching agony.  Now he touches it and a swirl of embers and bright sparks dance up into my belly.

“Put your hand over mine,” he growls.

I withdraw my hand and his settles between my labia.  Tentatively, waiting for him to reject the stickiness of my fingers, I spread my hand over his.  He growls when my hand settles on his, but it is a pleased, approving growl.  There is nothing offensive to him about my body’s arousal, and I toss my head in unrelieved relief.

He moves his hand, parting his index and middle fingers around my erect nub, pushing his fingertips down into the soft grooves on either side.  Squeezing the sides of his fingers along the ridge of my clitoris on the downstroke, he spreads them along my body’s wet valleys on the backstroke.  My eyes roll back in my head at the sensation.  My hips buck and I forget to follow his hand with mine.

He stops moving.  I gasp.

“Feet together.  Thighs apart.  Hand on mine.”

I sob at this exquisite torture.  Slowly, I force my body back into compliance with his commands, and surrender to the hypnotic rhythm of his fingers when they begin to move in me again.

I lose track of how many strokes, of how many times he tells me to put my feet together.  I should be sated from our earlier sex.  Instead, knowing what pleasure he will bring me heightens my need.  Each touch feels magnified.  Focus, control, thought, everything has thinned under his fingers until all I can do is feel.

It is nothing like when I touched myself in the bath.  With each stroke, my body tightens.  Tremors run through my thighs, held wide by his thumb and little finger.  I control them as well as I am able with my body slipping, slipping out of all control.

He pinches my tormented clitoris between his thumb and first finger and I cannot control a scream.  My hips buck, thighs juddering against the bed.  My release swells, building in tight waves.  But I am not quite there, and he does not bring me.

He waits, his fingers applying gentler pressure.  Enough to keep me wet and wanting, but not enough to push me over the edge.  Then he says, with infinite patience, “Feet together, Liaden.”

With each breath so fractured it is almost a sob, I struggle to bring any part of my body back under my control.  Finally, I force my feet back together.

And the Beast starts again, rubbing his thumb against my ridge in small circles, while his other fingers delve deeper.  He explores each wet fold, pressing, stroking, pinching, rubbing, while my breathing dissolves into a ragged panting and my thighs shake as though palsied.  Each touch drags me closer and closer to that edge, where the dance of pain and pleasure has begun anew, but never over it, never giving me the release that my body shakes and sweats and screams for.

“Please,” I beg.  He gave me what I wanted when I begged before.  How can he deny me now when my need is a thousand, thousand times greater?  “Please . . .” 

A husky chuckle.  “Please what?”

“Please, Riddick.  Please, I can’t stand anymore.”  I arch my neck against his thigh to look up into his eyes.  They fill with purely masculine satisfaction.  The hot gratification of having the woman under him beg for his touch.  The knowledge that, in this moment, only he can give me what I need.

He moves so fast I cannot follow him.  He is on top of me before my head even sags to the bed, abruptly deprived of the pillow of his thigh.  Heat and muscle roll over me, into me.  He lies between my legs, supporting himself on one arm while he reaches under me with the other, tilting my hips up to him and pushing his length and breadth inside me in one hard shove.  The shock and delight of it bows my back, arches my head back against the bed, forces the air out my lungs on a high note of affirmation.

Seated in me to the hilt, he rolls his hips, circling his phallus in me to stimulate each wailing nerve, to bring my inner muscles contracting down around him.  Looking up at him, my vision encompassed by those gleaming eyes, I see again that male satisfaction.  It is not merely the pleasure of his body in mine.  It is the knowledge that he has taken what I have offered, and that I have become _his_.

His hand runs up my back, arcing me to him, tilting my chest up so only my shoulders and buttocks touch the mattress.  He lowers his head to my chest and licks the skin between my breasts.  A moment of preparation, then he bites down.

My Collar flares.  The circle of black fire laps over him where he lies with his teeth sunk into my skin.  He lifts his head to watch the unlight spread from my throat.  Underlit by fire, his face grows heavy, avid; his eyes fill with blue flames.

Then his stomach and hips roll, a hard surge that drives him into me, all the way to my core.  I arch my back, pressing up even against his great weight, and scream with the intensity of the sensation.  He moves again, one thrust after another, building into an unstoppable, undeniable rhythm.  Each thrust drives against my core, bumping again and again against that deep barrier of my body that can barely contain him.

“Look at me,” he growls.

My eyes, flickering, rolling in my head, fix on him, on the reflection of primal satisfaction and black fire dancing in his eyes.  And it is that look, that pleasure and passion, that sends me over the edge.  His body, the insistent invasion of him, filling and overfilling me, is what hurls me.  But it is his eyes, the predatory rapture in them, that shatter me, breaking me on wave after wave of the most violent, most complete release I can imagine.

For long minutes afterwards, all I can do is lie still and remember how to breathe.  He sprawls across me, his massive weight driving me into the mattress.  His skin is hot and slick against mine.  His mouth still moves on me.  Tasting.  Licking and suckling.  Only a shade less demanding than when he claimed me.  His hands move languorously now, stroking and kneading my skin.  Black fire still runs across my flesh at his touch, crackling quietly around his fingertips.

“Good thing this doesn’t actually burn,” he murmurs.

Slowly regaining the use of my extremities, I reach up and stroke his head.  He growls, a heated shimmer across my skin.

“It can,” I whisper, finding, to my surprise, that I can use my mouth and teeth and tongue again.  “But it does not burn the man who controls the Collar.”

He rubs his face between my breasts, then bites down.  Not gentle, but not breaking the skin.  Those unbearably arousing bites of his that dance the fine edge of pain and pleasure.  An edge he has taught me, in a few short hours, to appreciate more than any other sensation I’ve ever felt.

He lifts his head and looks at me, one dark eyebrow arched.  “Meaning me.”

“Yes.”

He looks down at my throat, then props himself on one elbow while he strokes the Collar with his fingertips.  My world dissolves into a blurring, burning haze.

“Felt it,” he says, his voice dragging me back.  “Just then, when you looked at me.  And when they broke in here.  I felt your fear.”

“Forgive me,” I choke.  I did not realize I would inadvertently feed him my terror.  Another failing in a long line this night.

He chuckles.  “For what?”

“I didn’t mean to distract you.”

“Then you need to put some clothes on.”  He drops his head and licks along the edge of my Collar, where metal meets skin.

“Lord—”

“You saved my life.”  He applies his teeth again, and this time I cannot help but arch to him, to make a low begging sound in my throat, even though I should have had enough.  Surely we’ve both had enough.  “Only two other people ever risked their lives for me.  Never got to thank either of ‘em.”  Another bite.  “Thank you, Liaden.”

“It was—”

He surges up over me, his hand sinking into my hair, jerking my head backward, until we are nose-to-nose and his silver eyes burn into mine.

“If you say one fucking word about _duty_ ,” he warns, and the contained fury in his voice and eyes frightens me the way nothing else he has done this night has.

Is this the cause of those inexplicable moments of irritation?  Why?  It is my duty to advise and defend him.  Or is it that he wants something more from me?

“My pleasure,” I say distinctly.

He makes his deep sound in his chest, possibly the deepest sound I’ve heard from him, a _basso profundo_ rumble, and slides back down me.  I stroke his engulfing shoulders, soothing and gentling him, until he relaxes, sprawling heavily across me once more.

“No second thoughts?” he asks, between suckling bites.

“Second thoughts?”  I toss my head, trying to follow his train of thought around the titanic distraction of his mouth on my breasts.

“Killin’ him before he took this off?”  His fingers splay across the Collar and he lifts his head to look at me.

Unable to control my impatience, I tug his head back down, and he begins biting me again with a low, amused sound that reverberates in my flesh.

“No, Lord.  No second thoughts.”  I gasp at a particularly hard bite on the soft underside of my breast.  “My only thought was that I had failed . . .”  _In my duty_ , I almost say, but catch myself with monumental effort and cover my slip with a painful truth.  “You.”

He lifts his head and shakes off my hands when I try to push him back down.  “Failed me.  How?”

I press my lips together to control a sob, both at the loss of his mouth on me and at the admission of my failures.  “I left my weapons in my room . . . you were undefended.  And I showed them the weakness of your eyes . . . when I came into the throne room—”

He relaxes across me, biting me again so that my breath catches and I cannot finish my litany.  “I had a shiv under the mattress,” he says.  “Just took me a minute to get to my goggles.  Wouldn’t have been able to do that without you distracting them.”

“But your eyes—”

He rolls a pinch of skin between his teeth for a moment before answering me.  “Bound to come out sometime.”

“And-and I forgot—” I lose track of everything, what I have remembered, what I have forgotten, when he takes my nipple into his mouth and grazes it with his teeth.

He lifts his head.  “Forgot what?”

I am lost.  What did I forget?  Ohhh . . . oh, the secret passage.

“There is a secret door . . . in the wardrobe.  It leads . . . to the Lord Marshal’s Walk . . . through the resting place of Bayle.  One of the Greater Quasi Dead.  Pull . . . the armor display stand . . . forward . . .”

“Good to know,” he murmurs.  And then his fingers slide into me, opening me, readying me for his entrance, and I stop trying to think, to do anything but respond to him and the magnificent sensations he raises in me.

I wake to the smell of the sea, to warm skin under and against mine, to a pleasant, languorous weight around my waist.  Stirring sleepily, fragments of the dream I’ve woken from swirl in my head, and I recognize them as a memory.

Lying in my parents’ lodge, warm under my furs, and listening to them couple.

They were discreet, as adults with four children sleeping only a few meters away must be.  But my mother was training me to be a hunter, and small sounds, small movements, brought my senses alert.  Fascinated by this thing from which we children were excluded, I slid down to peer through the slit in the skins hanging around my bed.

Through a similar slit in the draperies of my parents’ bed, I could see my mother.  Her back, golden skinned in the light of the banked night fire, and rippled with the _di’an_ marks of her five kills, reared out of the furs.  I could not see my father under her, but his big hands, so capable with bow and spear and knife, moved up and down her back.  She rocked above him, her back arching, her hair lapping around them, and the soft noises of their coupling floated to me on the warm air.  The wet sounds of flesh on flesh.  Her muted cries and his deeper groans.

Their slow rocking went on for a long time, I remember, but I continued to watch, fascinated.  Their motions and sounds stirred me.  I had been promised to Hanuel only days before, and I knew, with the vague understanding of a child, that one day I would do something similar with him.  And so, fascinated and stirred, I watched and listened as their movements grew frenzied and their muffled noises peaked.

My mother collapsed on top of my father at the end.  He held her, his hand sweeping the curtain of dark hair off her back, over her shoulder, winding his fingers through it, while he held her and whispered love-words to her in the dark.

I had not remembered.  Purification took away the good memories with the bad, and I had forgotten.

I slide up the Beast’s side.  He murmurs and his hands flex on my neck and in the small of my back.  His big, warm hands.  They must look on my back the way my father’s hands looked on my mother’s.

I lower my face into the strong column of his neck.  His scent, animal musk and sweat and the seawater tang of sex, fills me.  Was this what my mother smelled on my father when she lay against him after their coupling?  To me, with the senses of a child, my father always smelled like furs and our lodge and safety.  But my mother must have smelled different things on him.  As I smell them on the Beast.

Drawn by the smell and feel of him, I lick my way up the Beast’s neck.  He chuckles sleepily and pulls me more firmly on top of him.  Would he like me to ride him the way my mother rode my father?  How would she have started?

I am not my mother, although I bear her name and her eyes and, I hope, some of her spirit.  The Beast and I have our own codes and rituals.

Nipping the long cord of his neck, I whisper, “Let me please you.”

Another sleepy chuckle.  “That mean you want to go on top?”

“Yes.”

He humors me, letting me slide on top of him, rub myself against him.  But he draws his hips away whenever I try to impale myself.  Aching and needing, I bite his throat in frustration.  He chuckles against my teeth.

“Be patient.”  His hands close on my hips, slowly moving me over him in a glide of heat and wetness.  “It’s worth the wait.”

Is this the source of his endless control?  Does he truly enjoy me so much that he prolongs each coupling to the point of agony before he gives us both release?

His answer stretches through long minutes of want and frustration, but finally he lets me slide down onto him, taking him within my body, and ride him, slowly at first, as slowly as I saw my mother ride my father, and then faster, harder, his hands on my hips controlling his penetration, a little more, a little deeper, with each thrust, until I am fully impaled and crying out with each glorious surge.  I finally feel the strength he keeps contained when his hips ram up into me with unimaginable force.  Force that would wound and tear if I was not so ready for him, if he was not so careful with me.  The sense of his strength does for me this time what his eyes did before, sending me screaming and shuddering into my release.  Black fire erupts around us even as he erupts within me.

In the aftermath, he pulls me down onto him, spilling my skin and hair across him.  His hands sweep the damp strands of my hair off my back, balling it and gathering it into his fist.  He whispers no love-words, and I do not expect any.  He is not my father.  He is a Beast, and beasts have no need of love, no matter what the Elemental believes.

An inexplicable sadness churns through me, sharper and more painful than the churning of my oh so empty stomach.

His hands tighten on me, holding me closer as though he senses my melancholy.  With soft kisses across my brow, he lifts me off him and settles me against his side.  We quickly find that position that best suits us both, with my head pillowed on his massive shoulder, my hand over his heart, my thigh cradled between his.  He tangles one hand in my hair, strokes the other down my back.  His fingers rub back and forth over a spot just below my shoulder blades that feels strangely sensitive.  All of my skin tingles, rubbed raw by his mouth and hands and sex.  But this spot is more than raw.  It feels scorched.

“What is this?” he mutters.  He strains his neck until he can look over my shoulder.  Then he relaxes back onto the pillow with a chuckle.  “You really are Daixian.”

How could he know what I was remembering when I woke?  “What do you mean?”

“You got two of those red marks comin’ up on your back.  Edellis and the other one your first two kills?”

“Yes, they’re the first men I’ve killed . . . what do you mean I have marks coming up on my back?”

His hand in my hair shifts, then tightens.  “I’d tell you to go look, but I’m not ready to let you up yet.  You’ll have to take my word on it.”

 _Di’an_ _marks_?  But I converted.  I was Purified.  I am True and Faithful.  I do not pray to Xia or sing the holy songs or observe the rituals anymore.  How could I have di’an marks on my back?

I shiver and the Beast moves his hand to the small of my back.  “I can hear what you’re thinkin’,” he growls.

“What, Lord?”

“ _Riddick_.  An’ I can hear you thinkin’ that there’s something wrong with you.”

“I should not have di’an marks if I am one of the Faithful.  I am . . . unclean.”  I begin to shrink away from him.  He should not touch me.  I must be Purified again . . .

“Where you goin’?”

“I should call a purifier—”

“Think they’ll want to hear from you, after last night?”

Is that why the marks have appeared?  Is Damalis punishing me for killing Edellis and Enar?  But I killed them in defense of the Lord Marshal . . . except that the Beast is no true Lord Marshal.  But he holds the Throne and the Dead honor him . . . my head spins with a stupefying mix of duty and doubt.  I put my forehead down on his shoulder and try to sort through my confusion.  And as ever, there is no help from the god.  Damalis has always been silent in my mind.  Unlike Xia, who used to sing to me when Tarenge’s twin moons were full.

And then there is a voice.  A soft, low voice, not unlike the Beast’s.  A voice that whispers inside my head, “Welcome home, child.”

My head snaps up.  “Did you—?”

“Did I what?”

I shake my head.  He did not hear it, because I was imagining it.  Hunger and my divided loyalties have addled me.

The Beast lifts his head, bringing his face so close to mine his jaw brushes my cheek.  I hear him inhale deeply.  “You smell—”

“Interesting?”  I offer, in an attempt to distract us both.

“Very,” he growls.  “Let’s eat.”

The abrupt change in conversation leaves me adrift, wondering and unsure of what I should do.  Of what I must do.

“C’mon, Liaden.”

His voice recalls my duty.  First and always I serve my Lord Marshal.

I roll off him and drag myself, trembling from the many abuses done to my body in the night, out of the bed and over to the Lord Marshal’s desk.  I blank the massive blue lens.  I am no fit state to be seen by Chef or anyone else.  With only my voice, I open a channel to the galley.

It is early.  Six-hundred by the chronometer on the desk.  Have we slept at all?  It feels as though we have not.  Perhaps that explains my hallucinations.

No matter the time, Chef will be in the galley.  Sometimes I think he sleeps there, curled up on one of the huge ovens he clings to despite the perfectly good recyclers at his disposal.

And, as I expected, Chef answers my call.  Although it is not protocol, he does not object when I order an early meal.  As I instruct him to serve it in the Lord Marshal’s chambers, the Beast’s deep voice rumbles from somewhere behind the bed’s canopies, near the door to my chamber.

“In the throne room,” he says.

I quickly correct my instructions, thank Chef and close the channel with another pass of my hand.  When I round the bed, the Beast is gone.  Where did he go so silently?

An oddity in my chamber catches my attention.

There is a gown laid across my bed, white against black.  The Beast?  Surely not one of the Servants of the Chamber.  No one touches my clothes except to clean them.  And no one but he would presume to choose my clothes for me.  I move into my chamber and stand over the bed.

The gown is not one I have worn before.  It was made for me just before the fashions of the court changed to favor the scalecloth the Weavers developed in celebration of our conquest of Jeranda.  But white is appropriate for the days of Mourning, no matter what the current vogue.  I run my hand down the front of the gown.

I’d forgotten how beautiful this one is.

Seeing a faint red mark on my wrist, vivid against my pale skin and the white of the gown, reminds me that I must cleanse myself before I dress.  I am covered with the marks of the Beast’s claiming.  Some of those will not come off no matter how well I scrub myself.  But I could at least remove the sweat and other fluids that stain my skin.

But I find myself curiously reluctant to do so.  There is something sensuous and powerful about wearing his marks so boldly.  So after merely rubbing a cloth over my skin, I draw on the gown.

When I close the gown’s metal clasps and the bodice settles around me, I realize why the Beast chose it.  The tight white sleeves rise to a collar that frames my throat.  From the high collar, the neckline flares all the way to my shoulders, exposing my entire chest.  It drops in a wide vee over my breasts, open all the way to the point at my navel.

Each mark on my throat and chest, on the shallow curves of my breasts and stomach, is limned in white for all to see.

I turn my head toward the Lord Marshal’s chamber, where I hear the small sounds of the Beast’s movement.  He picked this gown.  He must have guessed how I would look in it.  At what it would expose.  I should be disgusted that he wants to display me this way.  But I’m not.  How can I be when I felt the same impulse?

I run my hands down the gown, settling it into place against my body.  The bodice is fitted, so that nothing is inadvertently exposed, but not in the sprayed-on manner of the court wantons.  Gold chases the bodice, emphasizing the shallow contours of breast and waist.  Golden bracers circle the sleeves at my wrists, providing housing for the Nightshade Darts.  The long, silken over and under-skirts fall straight from the fitted waist.  A wide, flat panel of white leatheren covers my stomach and thighs, tapering to a point just below my knees.  I cannot help but smile at the Beast’s choice.  He can be subtle, but he has thrown subtlety aside in the selection of this gown.

The front panel of the skirt has a hidden advantage.  It conceals a knife sheath.  After Edellis’s attack, I want Hannelore to hand, and the Beast must intuit this.  When I go to retrieve her from under my pillow, the sanctum is empty again.  Where has the Beast gone now?  Wondering, I slip my dagger into the hidden sheath and smile at the reassuring weight of her against my thighs.  Around the leatheren panel, the skirts are silken, diaphanous, very unfashionable, but they drape well around my legs, hinting at the form beneath.  A strong contrast to rest of the courtiers, particularly Vaako’s snake.  As the Beast no doubt intended.  Perhaps his choice is more subtle than I thought.

After I settle my weapons in their places, I return to my dresser to see to my skin and hair.

A Concubine’s glory is reserved for the Lord Marshall, and only he may see her true beauty.

I have been true to my vows.  I have dressed demurely, bound up my hair, worn few of the gems and adornments that Fainche left me, hidden my beauty so well that I have overheard some of the courtiers wonder aloud why the Lord Marshal would chose such a plain woman as his First.

But the Beast wants to flaunt me this morning.  That is the purpose of the gown and of dining in the Great Hall.  So I leave the paler for my skin in its pot, letting my natural hue stand in pale gold contrast to the red marks covering my throat and chest.  I refresh the liner burned into my eyelids, a process that hurts more than it should, and then open a small case I have not used before.

The current vogue is for bluish lips, in the fashion of the Dead.  It would take a great deal of maquillage to make my lips blue today.  They are red, flushed with the force of the Beast’s phallus and mouth.  Touching my fingers to the open case, I select a balm that will redden my lips even further, making them as glossy as if he had just kissed me.

Wiping off my fingers, I catch an unfamiliar reflection in my mirror.  A stranger with eyes that smolder and skin that glows.  She stands within the tousled curtain of her own hair and looks unashamed, proud even, of her beauty and the power it holds.

I bite my lip, uncertain at the sight of this fey woman.  Under the rose taste of the balm, an animal taste, salt-sweat and musk and skin.  _Him_.

His taste straightens my spine, firms my resolve.  He has honored me in a way Zhylaw never did.  Perhaps there is no value in this honor, the honor of a Beast, the honor of flesh.

But I feel honored.  I feel honored in a way I have never felt honored before.

I shake myself out of such strange thoughts.  My unbound hair shivers around my shoulders.  I pick up a brush and apply it carefully, working through the knots and tangles his hands have left behind, until it falls in a shining, dark curtain to my waist.

Across my dressing table, on domes and in containers, lie many ornaments for binding up my hair.  But the Beast prefers it to fall free.  So I only gather a few strands away from my face and fasten them at the back of my head with the Rift clasp.

With the last of my weapons safely in place, I turn toward the Lord Marshal’s chamber.  The containers of jewels, stacked and unused, on my dressing table catch my eye.  No, the dress is enough in itself.  With my hair as adornment.

But . . .

I search through the boxes until I find them.  The platinum filigree claps wrap around the rim of each ear.  The jewels depend perfectly from the middle of my lobes.  I turn my head to catch their flash in my mirror.  Silver moonstones.  From Aquilia.  Their luster is a match for his eyes.  They glow against the darkness of my hair.

Feeling strong and powerful despite the light-headedness of fasting and the dizzying events of last night and this morning, I walk into the Lord Marshal’s chamber.

The Beast rises from his chair, blanking the desk’s great blue lens with a pass of his hand.  He stands and watches me, eyes gleaming in the low light.  Waiting, I sense, for me to come to him.

I do, taking in his freshly shaved skin, the sleeveless Dyneemal tunic that displays his massive shoulders to such advantage.  He has added his black leather bracers, but no other armor.  He is so physically intimidating just in his own skin that he needs none.

“I would have bathed you,” I say softly as I draw close.

He chuckles.  “Don’t know how many baths with you I can survive.”

I smile.  Bathing him is a rare pleasure.  For us both, it seems.

He leans towards me, and I hear him inhale deeply.

“Do I still smell interesting?”

“More an’ more all the time.”

The voice and the strange marks on my back, which I forgot to confirm in my mirror but I have no doubt are there – if he says something is so, it is so – still confound and frighten me.  But it is hard to be afraid of anything when he looks at me with his glowing eyes, taking in the silver-white gems shining against my hair, the marks that the dress leaves so boldly in view.  In that moment, all I can bring myself to care about is his approval, and the honor he does me when he offers me his arm to walk down to the Great Hall.

“May I ask you something?” I ask softly as we take the winding stairs.  Since I am wearing soft slippers instead of tottering in heels, I hold onto his arm and walk down beside him.

“Yeah?”

“It is about your past.  I know you do not like questions—”

“Just ask, Liaden.”  A low rumble, tinged with impatience, but still indulgent.

“How do you know so much about my birth religion?”  When he says nothing, I continue.  “You knew I was the child of sorrow, and you knew about the di’an marks.  I just wondered—”

“Hitched a ride with a Daixian once.  Free-trader outta Cseke.  Long trip between Cseke and anywhere.  So I got to know him a little.  He told me.”

Cseke.  The most distant outpost of Addeus, the Daixian homeworld.  And a dead planet.  Destroyed in the Monc-Sul wars a decade ago.  “But there is nothing out that way—”

“Except a slam.  Yeah.”

A convict.   I had forgotten.  An escaped convict, by the sounds of it. The oddity of it strikes me afresh, makes my head spin.

At the bottom of the stairs he stops and looks at me.  “Still wanna hold hands?”

Puzzled, I search his face, his eyes.  His expression is, as ever, unrevealing.  But there is something in those silver eyes.  A faint uncertainty, so unlike him.

“Of course.”  I tighten my grip on his arm.  “Did your trader friend tell you about the Voice of Xia?”

He remains still, standing at the base of the stairs, looking at me.  “No.”

His attention gives me the courage to go on.  “Third and fifth children are consecrated to the god.”  Me.  Little Tatlynn, who should have become a bride of Xia on her eighteenth birthday.  Except the Necromongers came instead.  “Some of us . . . after consecration . . . heard the voice of the god.”

His eyes flick over mine.  “Did you?”

I nod, hesitant to confirm such sacrilege here in the heart of the Basilica.  “Xia sang to me, sometimes,” I whisper.  “And-and—”

“This morning,” he says.  It is not a question.  Somehow, he knows.

I bow my head.  “Do you see why I must be Purified again?  I am unclean—”

Heedless of our exposed position at the bottom of the stairwell, the Beast draws me close.  He drops his head until his warm mouth brushes my ear.  “Clean enough for me,” he whispers.

“No, Lord—”

“Riddick,” he growls.

I can barely bring myself to say it when we are alone, when he is inside me.  And certainly not when we are standing in the open and I am confessing my sin to him.  “Please,” I whisper, turning my face into the comfort of his chest.

“You believe what you told Edellis?”

His question is so unexpected that I shake my head, lost.  “What?”

“That I’m the faith.  You believe that?”

It defies logic.  Defies everything.  But I must believe it.  The purifiers teach that the man who sits on the Throne is the source of the Faith.  That it flows through the Lord Marshal to each of the Faithful.  There is no caveat, no exception for an unbeliever.  Damalis’s will is a mystery.  And mysteries must simply be accepted.  Although I do not understand how he – unpurified and unconverted – can be the source of the Necromonger faith, I must believe it.

The Dead honor him, and he wakes the black fire of the Collar.  How can I believe anything else?

“Yes,” I say quietly.

“Then stop questionin’ me.”

I shiver with shame.  “I did not mean to question you.”

He chuckles.  “You been questionin’ me from the start, Liaden.  From the moment you didn’t kneel.”

I lift my head in horror.  How long has he known?  “I-I have knelt to you—”

He smiles lazily.  “I remember.”

The wicked gleam in his eyes tells me he is thinking of when I pleasured him.  “That is not what I meant—”

“Liaden, you coulda killed me a dozen times.  Coulda let them kill me last night.  Why d’you keep savin’ my ass?”

How does he know?  Can he smell my uncertainty along with my arousal?  Has he always known of the conflict that rages inside my breast whenever I let myself dwell on the question of his fitness to command me?

I shake my head.  The time for such questions is past.  He holds the Throne.  He controls my Collar.  “I do.  I do believe.  You’re the Lord Marshal.”

He runs his fingertips along my jaw.  “Either I am, or I’m not.  You gotta decide, Liaden.”

What is there to decide?  Uncomprehending, I look up at him.

“C’mon, I’m hungry.”

He does not leave me to trail behind him, as Zhylaw would have done, but escorts me into the Great Hall and up the steps to the Throne where his breakfast waits. 


	17. Chapter 17

The court attends him.  Despite the hour and the departure from the Lord Marshal’s daily protocol, everyone seems to be awake, and to find some reason to appear in the Great Hall.  They come to gawk, to see the man who survived assassins in the night.  And to pay him grudging homage.

The Beast sits heavily on the Throne, listening to the reports of his officers and commanders.  I sit at his right hand and serve him breakfast from the hovering banquet table.  The Beast ignores the stares, and the whispers from those milling around on the floor, and so I do likewise, concentrating on serving him perfectly, flawlessly, so that he does not even need to glance at me before I have anticipated his next wish.

With my attention so focused, it would be easy to ignore those reporting to him.  But I listen and watch out of the corner of my eye, in case he needs me to advise him.  In case he needs me to defend him.  Edellis’s attack has left me twice as wary of the courtiers.

His officers bring him news of the Armada and our progress towards the Threshold.  Plans of the attack on the Galin homewords.  Scalp-Taker and Toal bring the first bit of bad news.

“A report from the _Dys_ , Lord Marshal,” Toal says, kneeling on the step below the Throne.  He manages to tear his eyes off my chest, but only by bowing his head.  “Insurrection.”

I vaguely remember the _Dys_ being one of the ships he assigned to go with Scalp-Taker to clear the way to the Threshold.

“Let me bring you the heads of the malcontents, Lord Marshal,” says Scalp-Taker.

The Beast’s eyes flick from one commander to the other.  “Take a squad of Elites.  Go to the Dys and arrest the troublemakers.  Bring ‘em to me.”  He looks sternly at Scalp-Taker.  “No heads.”

The commander glares at the Beast’s boots sullenly.

“Plenty of time for that between here and the Threshold,” the Beast says, his tone softening.  Scalp-Taker looks up, surprise and pleasure registering faintly on his face.

The Beast understands his commander well.

“I request the honor of accompanying Scalp-Taker,” Toal says stolidly.

I offer the Beast a bite of sausage, in case he wants a moment to think.  I can see why he would want to send Toal with Scalp-Taker.  But if Aimi has asked Toal to move their union ceremony to today as she said she would . . .

The Beast chews and swallows before he says lightly, “Don’t you got something else to do today?”

She did ask, then.  And Toal asked the Beast, and the Beast, knowing that today was my final day, said yes.

My chest tightens and I cannot look at the Beast.

Toal is so duty-bound he does not even smile.  “Nothing is more important than serving my Lord Marshal.”

The Beast grins and takes another bite of sausage.  “Mmm.  Go along, then.  But be back before the ceremony.  With a report.”

The two commanders stand and salute snappily.

While they descend the stairs and before the next commander approaches the Throne, the Beast murmurs to me, “They’re all just itchin’ for somethin’ to do.”

I nod.  “Keeping the Legions occupied between conquests was a constant challenge for Lord Zhylaw.”

The Beast’s eyes narrow.  “Later, I wanna hear more about that.”

“Of course, Lord.”

Some ploys he will like.  Intensive training exercises.  Deep reconnaissance runs to ensure we missed no inhabited systems.  Some he will not.  The wholesale destruction of small colonies.  Like Furya.  Not to convert, but simply to prevent them from ever becoming a threat. 

A silence in the Great Hall brings my head up, focuses my attention on the steps to the Throne instead of on the Beast.  He follows my eyes to where his new commander, Daray, kneels on the steps.

Daray launches into a report from the lensor teams scouting the systems ahead.  But it is neither his report nor his newness that has caused the stir.  It is the woman who kneels a step below him.  Thin chains circle her hands and throat; Daray holds the ends of the chains in one hand.

I grip my hands tightly around the utensils I hold to keep from shaking.

I know her.  Sanjula, from the _Accalia_.  She is not a member of the court, nor a renowned beauty like Dame Vaako, who is among the crowd on the floor of the Great Hall.  But I know her.  She came to visit Nathine, Kryll’s concubine who became a pilot but returned to the Basilica for her retirement.  Sanjula was Nathine’s protégé on the _Accalia_ , and visited her mentor often.  The three of us gardened together one day, and Sanjula was one of the few visitors to my garden who displayed no fear of the lupinarus.

Now Sanjula returns to the Basilica in chains.  There are red marks on her velvet brown throat where the chain has rubbed her skin raw.  Her pilot’s robes hang open, exposing a light, white undergarment that covers her from shoulders to calves.  It is ripped up one thigh.  Although she keeps her head bowed, I can see the tears that simmer in her dark eyes.

Tears that she, like I, when I was brought before Lord Zhylaw and he put the Collar on me, will not let fall.

“Tea, Liaden,” the Beast grunts, startling me.

“Yes, Lord.”  I reach across him and begin mixing the nettle tea he favors without offering him the Tray of Leaves.  I freeze when I realize my mistake.

“Who’s the girl?” he murmurs, and I understand that his request is merely a diversion.

“Sanjula,” I whisper back.  “A pilot from the Accalia.  He intends to claim her as his concubine.”

“That what the chains’re for?”

“Yes, Lord.  She must have resisted.”  It is an old tradition, bringing a reluctant concubine before the Lord Marshal in chains, but not so old that it has been forgotten.  Daray, it seems, is a student of history.

The Beast accepts the nettle tea without comment, and waits through Daray’s report, showing no hint of impatience.  I try to emulate him, but know I am failing when I hear the sound of my teeth grinding together even over Daray’s precise drone.  It is impossible to listen to him, to look at him, to focus on anything but the young woman behind him, kneeling in chains and crying silently, without letting her tears fall.

The chain around her neck could be a collar.  The red marks on her skin could be burns from where she was punished over and over for refusing to give her Lord Marshal her vow.  Her lips could be bloody, bitten through in her effort not to scream while the Collar was forced over her head, into her flesh . . .

The Beast sets his tea on the hover table suddenly, and pats the arm of the Throne.  When I glance at him in confusion, he pats it again.

Puzzled but obedient, I put my arm where he has indicated and lean toward him.

He brushes aside my hair and slides his hand under the neckline of my gown to spread his warm fingers across the nape of my neck.  When his skin touches my Collar, calm laps through me, soothing away my rising panic.

Behind the calm, a complex tide of emotions.  How could I ever have thought him uncaring or disinterested?

 _Resolution_.  He already knows how he will handle Daray.  _Satisfaction_.  A deep, abiding sense of satisfaction.  Layer upon layer of it.  A full belly.  Sleeping warm in a soft bed.  Waking smooth and easy, without any pain.  Good smells, hair and skin and sex.  _Satiation_.  Deeply satisfying release and the anticipation of more.  _Contemplation_.  A problem he’s turning over and over in his mind.  Scrutinizing various angles and possibilities . . .

His hand slides up the back of my neck, breaking contact with the Collar.  Although he’s no longer feeding me his emotions, the calm he has imparted remains.  It keeps my darkest memories at bay.

He caresses my nape while we listen to the end of Daray’s report.

An awkward silence descends, and the Beast lets it stretch for several moments while he strokes my neck.  His hand settles back around the Collar, and he says, “What about the girl?”

Daray draws himself up.  “I claim her as my concubine.”

“I got that,” the Beast says, his growl lightening almost to a drawl.  “What’s she got to say about it?”

Daray looks so shocked the Beast might have stabbed him instead of asking a simple question.  He would have been better off studying the Beast than history.  “My Lord, she has no—”

The Beast ignores him.  “Sanjula, anything you want to say?” he asks, his tone the gentlest I have ever heard.

She raises her head and, finally, a tear slides down her cheek.  “I’d be proud to be his companion.  I told him that.  But I won’t be any man’s slave.”

The Hall stills on a collective gasp.

The Beast watches Sanjula for a heartbeat.  He shifts on the Throne and his hand flexes against my Collar, a warm, comforting pulse.  “Liaden look like a slave to you?”

It takes every ounce of control I have not to start in surprise.  He uses _me_ as an example? 

Sanjula’s dark, tear-filled eyes flick to me and I am too shocked to do anything but stare back at her.

“No, Lord Marshal,” Sanjula says, her voice small.

“Tell her what you told me,” the Beast murmurs to me.

What I told him?  My mind races through the things I have told him.  I can remember nothing pertinent.

“A concubine serves her lord,” I say slowly, trying to piece together words that reflect both the truth and the promise of my station.  “But she is not a slave.  It is her honor to put her lord’s health and well-being foremost in her heart.  Protecting him from his enemies, making sure his needs are met, assuring his comfort – these are her sacred duties.  They are a sacrifice . . . but not slavery.”

I look beyond Sanjula, beyond the crowd of courtiers, to the far end of the Great Hall, where Vinay’s builders have started to erect a sixth statue.  To Zhylaw.

“And if a concubine’s lord is true,” I say softly.  “True to his vow, he will cherish her sacrifice and honor her above all others for it.  She will be first in his heart as he is first in hers.  Not even Death can part a concubine and her true lord.”

When I notice the ringing silence that greets my words, I drop my eyes and find the entire court staring at me.  Embarrassed, I look away, and turn my head directly into the spotlight of the Beast’s silver gaze.

His eyes flare; a rime of black fire dances along the links of my Collar.

“I will honor and obey you,” I whisper.  “In life.  In Death.  ‘Til UnderVerse come.”

The Beast frowns thunderously.  “What?”

Aghast, I bow my head.

What have I done?  I have given him my vow.  A vow Zhylaw had to wring out of me with punishment so severe it left my flesh blackened.  Punishment so awful four Elites had to hold me down to prevent me from burning off my own fingers trying to wrench the Collar from my skin and bone.

And I have given it willingly to the Beast.  To my Lord Marshal.

What will he say?  Will he give me his vow in return?

I hold my breath, waiting.

Instead, he growls, “What did you say?”

There is no softness in his voice now.  His calm has vanished and I can feel a wave of rising anger through my Collar.  And then, in the moment before his hand drops away, disgust.

Horrified, I look up at him.  His face is taut, the bones of cheek and jaw prominent under the skin.  His eyes, narrowed to a mercuric crescent, flick over my face.

 _Disgust_.  He feels disgust for me.  I have offered him my vow and he feels disgust.

I shrink away from him and place my hands carefully in my lap.  “Nothing, Lord,” I whisper.

“Lady Liaden,” Sanjula begins.  I cannot look up.  I do not want to see whatever expression her face holds.  Is she oblivious to what has passed between me and the Beast?  Or has the entire court watched and snickered while the Beast rejected me?  Does her face hold that most terrible of all things from a stranger: pity?

“You make it sound noble,” Sanjula continues.  I hear her take several deep breaths, loud even over the growing current of whispers rising from the floor of the Hall.  “If I could be like you . . . if I could be fearless like you . . . I heard you didn’t even scream when Lord Zhylaw put that collar on you.  But I’m not that strong.  I’m afraid of what will happen if he puts that thing on me.  I don’t want it.  I won’t do it—”

The Beast snarls, a low, carrying noise that silences the Hall.  “There’ll be no more fucking slave collars.  Not for you.”  A pause.  “Not for anyone.”

He hates my Collar. I knew he objected to it initially, but I thought he had come to appreciate it.  To understand the usefulness of it.  Even to enjoy the connection between us.  But I was wrong.  Wrong about the Collar.  Wrong about what would please him.  Wrong about what he wants from me.  Wrong, wrong, wrong.

I squeeze my eyes closed.

“You got that, Daray?” the Beast growls.

The new commander makes a strangled noise.  “Yes, my Lord Marshal.”

“Anythin’ else, Sanjula?” the Beast asks, his tone gentling.  It rips at my heart.  I offer him my soul and he can only bark at me.  A stranger appears before him and he shows her great kindness.

“My Lord,”  She pauses and takes another deep breath.  “My Lord, if Lady Liaden would train me . . . so I could see it the way she does.  Then I wouldn’t object.”

So she can be like I am?  So that she can sit at her lord’s right hand, still wearing the marks of his claiming, and have him hand back her heart as if it was a cold cup of tea?  I strangle a bitter laugh.

“Daray?” the Beast growls.

“Yes, my Lord Marshal,” the new commander answers, and there is something in his voice, something that I would not have heard if I did not have my head down, something that I would not have recognized if my own wild dismay wasn’t clawing apart my chest.

Desperation.  He’s so desperate to have Sanjula that he would do anything, promise anything.

“It would be my great honor to have your lady train my concubine.”

A pause, and the air grows heavy with expectation.  Do they wait for me to say something?  What am I to say?

“Liaden?”  The Beast’s growl drops into that abyssal rumble.  There is no softness, no tenderness in that abyss.  I offer him my vow and he gives me only the bottomless hatred he feels for all things Necromonger.

“What would the Lord Marshal have of me?” I ask tonelessly.

I hear him blow a breath out through his nose.  A sound of frustration kept tightly in check.  “Will you train her.”

It is not a question.  It is a command.  And I have just vowed to obey him.  “Yes, Lord,” I say.  “But a concubine’s training takes weeks.  My successor will have to complete it.” 

The Beast grunts.  A odd sound, as though the wind has been knocked out of him.  Not a sound I have heard him make before, and so I cannot tell if it holds approval or annoyance.  I do not lift my head to find out.  The image of his face, of his anger and disdain, still rides behind my eyes.  I need no fresh reminder.

“Anythin’ else, Daray?”

I hear the commander shuffle his feet.  “I would be honored if you would witness our vows, my Lord.”

“Now?” the Beast growls.

“It is traditional—” Daray begins.

To exchange vows after the lord has claimed his concubine.  But from the state of Sanjula’s clothes, it is not hard to guess that Daray has already done so.

“Go ahead.”

“Lady Liaden?” Sanjula asks, and I finally lift my head.  While I have had my head bowed, Daray has removed the chains, and Sanjula has pulled her robes closed.  She offers me a tentative smile when my eyes reach her face.  “I haven’t been trained.  I don’t know the words.”

Perhaps she didn’t hear me humiliate myself.

“I swear to honor and obey you,” I say dully.  “In life.  In Death.  ‘Til UnderVerse come.”

Sanjula’s eyes, fringed with eyelashes still clumped together by tears, widen.  She did hear me.  She just didn’t understand.

She turns to Daray and repeats the Concubine’s Vow.

Daray needs no instruction.  He takes one of her hands and looks into her eyes while he says, “I accept your vow.  And I swear to cherish and command you.  In life.  In Death.  ‘Til UnderVerse come.”  His voice is hushed, reverent, and I can see wonder on his face.  When Sanjula smiles at him, he touches her cheek gently.

I choke on something raw that tastes of blood.  My tongue.  My heart.  I don’t know.  I lower my head again.

Zhylaw smiled at me, his thin, chilly smile, after he said those words.  Said them so glibly in response to the vow he forced from me.  But it was a lie.  He commanded me, bent me to his will.  But he never cherished me.  He never even honored me with his touch.  The Half-Dead have no need of love, the Elemental said.  She was right.

And the man who has honored me, whose rough passion and ensuing tenderness I foolishly conflated with affection, sits silent on the Throne.  My devotion amuses him.  My vow repulses him.  He will not offer me his.

The Beast shifts on the Throne, making some gesture I cannot see, but people swirl around us in response.  Sanjula and Daray descend the stairs.  The chains Sanjula wore hang loose from Daray’s right hand.  His left is clasped around hers.  At the bottom of the stairs, they step aside to let an Elite in full armor advance.  Sanjula glances back up the steps.  With my head bowed, I can just see her face.  Her eyes catch mine and she offers me a small smile.

I lower my head until I cannot see her.

The Elite clanks up onto the step below and begins to report on the arrest of Varkony.  The Master Armorer has refused to confess.  Refused to even speak to anyone but the Lord Marshal.

“That is his right,” I murmur to the Beast, recalling my duty but keeping my eyes on my knees.  “As a master of his trade.  He has the right to appeal directly to the Lord Marshal.”

A low noise.  “I’ll talk to him after training.”

Training.  In the onslaught of this morning’s events and emotions, I had forgotten training.  I will have to hurry to clean away the Beast’s breakfast and change to avoid being late.

“May I go, Lord?”

“Where?” he grunts.

“I need to change before training.”

Silence. I dare not look up.  I cannot bear to see his face, that cold, remote expression.

“First get yourself something to eat.”

My breath hitches in my chest.  He commands me to break my fast?  Why?

“Yes, Lord, if you command it—”

“Thought I just did.”

“—it is our tradition for the court to fast for three days after a Lord Marshal’s death—”

“I don’t give a fuck about your traditions.  Eat something.”

I stiffen.  He rejects my vow and spits on the bond between Lord Marshal and Concubine.  That is his right, to reject me.  But he has no right to dishonor Zhylaw’s memorial.  “Lord—”

“Liaden,” he growls, his voice low and thick with warning.  “You’re no use to me if you pass out from hunger.  I let it go yesterday, but today you’re eating.”

He knew?  He knew and he indulged me?  As he would a pet or a child?

“I have never fainted in my life,” I hiss.  “Not even when the Collar of the Whip was put on me.  Now if my Lord has finished dining and would excuse me, I need to prepare for the morning’s training session . . . ”

A murmuring begins among the courtiers malingering near the Throne.  I am embarrassing him.  Flouting him.

I hear the bass note of anger rumble through his voice when he snaps, “Eat.”

He has commanded me, and if I cannot change his mind, I will have to eat.  Or the Collar will punish me.

And I will be foresworn.

“Please, _my_ Lord Marshal, do not make me.”

He begins to growl, then falls silent.  When I look up, he is watching me, his head tilted to one side, his face impassive.  He takes a sip of tea and sits, considering.

“Okay, Liaden,” he says finally.  “You win.  You got another day.  But before we go to bed, you’re eating something.” His voice drops, low and dark and so suggestive that the Elite kneeling on the top step has to cough to cover his laughter.  “You’re gonna need your strength.”

I bow.  To display my gratitude, and to silence the whispers on the floor.  Slowly, mindful of the sharp spines at my back, I deepen my bow, until my forehead touches the arm of the Throne.  Complete acquiescence.  I have never made such an obeisance, not even to Zhylaw.

The Beast makes a small, surprised sound.  He puts his teacup down on the hovering table in front of him with a small clink.  His hand, hot from the tea, descends on my head and strokes my hair for a moment.  I lie still under his caress, not wanting to ruin this moment of tenuous connection.

“Liaden,” he murmurs.  The sound of my name, spoken in that deep voice, in the broken, breathy way he said my name during those dark hours when he claimed me, hums through me, a black current that sets my blood and bone singing.  “Go on,” he says roughly. 

I straighten and rise.  My head spins despite the control I try to exercise over each movement.  I steady myself against the hover table, and then reach toward the lens, preparing to lead it back to the galley.

The Beast catches my wrist.  “Leave it,” he growls.

Surprised, I glance at him.

His eyes roil, an inferno of rage and need held tightly, and only barely, in check.  He drops those flaming eyes and, following his gaze, I see why he does not want me to move the floating table.  To remove the barrier that shields his lap from the view of the court.

What has roused him so strongly?  Broken through that iron control?  Is it no more than my submission?  “Yes, my Lord.”

I bow to him and then pace down the steps of the Throne, avoiding the Elite, walking in as stately a fashion as I can, given the heated, seasick swirl of my head.  I avoid meeting anyone’s eyes as I pass through the crowd of courtiers.  There are no friends among this murder of crows, and the only eyes that matter are those behind me.  I feel his silver-hot glare on my back all the way to the doors.  The rage and desire I feel pressing against my back like a living thing lend strength to a step made unsteady by hunger and emotion.

When the Elites close the doors behind me, the hot pressure, and the strength it gave me, fall away.  I walk slowly up to the Lord Marshal’s chambers, hugging myself against the bitter cold that seems to pour down my spine.

 

An Elite I do not know stands at the Inner Doors.  He snaps me a salute before opening them.

“Who are you?” I ask, disoriented.  Where is Tiguan?

“Caden, my Lady.”

“Where—?”

And then, through the tumult in my head, it comes back to me.  Tiguan is dead.  Dead defending the Beast.  So much has happened; last night is a blur.

I start to put my hand over my eyes, but remember Caden standing there, staring at me.  I draw myself together as best I can.

“Welcome, Caden.  I am Liaden—”

The Elite’s face splits into a grin under his helmet.  “Everyone knows who you are, Lady Liaden.  I’m honored to guard you.”

Everyone knows who I am?  How awful.  I don’t want _anyone_ to know me.  Particularly not right now.  I would gladly fade into anonymity in this moment.

“Thank you.  Has Mistress Teshi spoken to you about the Lord Marshal’s schedule?”

Caden nods.

“Good.”  I offer him the best smile I can muster.  “It is good to have you with us, Caden.”  I move to pass him.

“Lady,” he says.  “I knew Tiguan.  He trained me.  I wasn’t sure if you knew that.  I know that he was with you for a long time, and that he called you friend.  I just wanted you to know, I won’t fail you.”

I swallow hard and force a smile.  “Thank you, Caden.”

He bows and I slip by him, through the sanctum and into my chamber, where I sink down on my bed.

Veer has been busy in the hours I’ve been gone.  Sprays of Calimbree roses fill my chamber.  Their thick perfume adds to the hunger and heartache making my head swim.

I rest my head in my hands and press my palms to my closed eyes.  How could I have forgotten Tiguan’s death?  I wonder where his body has been taken.  Sudden grief tightens my chest, closes my throat.  He died protecting me and I don’t even know where they’ve taken his body.

I shake my head.  He has died in the service of his Lord Marshal, and the Faith promises that all who die for the cause will be reborn in the UnderVerse, even if they die before their Due Time.  That is a mystery I have never understood.  But I pray, fervently and earnestly, that Tiguan strides even now through the Threshold, his axe gripped in one huge hand, to take his place at the doors of whatever chamber awaits my Lord Marshal there.

My Lord Marshal.

I have called the Beast _my_ Lord Marshal, and meant it.  He has claimed me.  Without the proper rituals or positions or purification, but, with the clarity of morning, I cannot deny the meaning of the black fire.  He is master of the Collar.  He is a true Lord Marshal.

But he will not complete the ritual.  He has rejected my vow.  Rejected me.  He enjoys me in his bed, enjoys my attentions to his body, but he does not hold me in his heart.  He will never look at me the way Daray looked at Sanjula when he accepted her vow and gave her his.

An eternity serving a man who does not love me.  I endured it once.  I knew, deep in my heart, that Zhylaw felt no true affection for me.  He enjoyed owning me, the way another man would horde precious metal, but he never cared for me.  And I bore it, because I knew nothing else.

But now I’ve known a passionate touch.  And although the Beast’s rejection has wiped away any foolish belief that lovemaking and love are one and the same, I can still feel the promise of one in the other.

To live, day after day, night after night, knowing that touch but having the promise of it forever withheld.  To live without love.  To have only half a vow.  That I cannot bear.

The Elemental was wrong.  It is not the Beast who will live with despair in his heart . . .

I won’t do it.  Sanjula called me fearless.  But I am afraid.  More afraid than I was when the Necromonger ships descended.  More afraid than I was when Zhylaw called me before him and put the Collar on me.  I have never been so afraid.  The thought of a future of this pain, day after day, makes me quail.

My stomach heaves and I clap my hands over my mouth to keep myself from vomiting.  Bile spurts sourly into the back of my throat.  I am empty.  I have nothing to purge.  But I need to.  Sweet Xia, how I need to.

I want to run.  There is nowhere to run to, but I’m overwhelmed with the need to run, to escape.  I could bolt for the armory.  Take Neirja from her golden sheath and plunge her into my breast.  At least that would end this terrible ache.

I am half-way to my feet before I remember my promise to the Beast.

He asked for another day.  Nothing more.  He could have commanded me to remain at his side.  To renounce my vow to follow Zhylaw.  But he has not.  He has only asked me for another day.  And even though the impetus behind his request is gone, removed by my own hand, he has not freed me from my promise.  Until he does, I will give him his day.  I will begin training Sanjula and suggest a successor if he asks.  And then I will take Neirja into my breast the way I have taken the Beast into my heart.

Perhaps she will be kinder to me than he has been. 


	18. Chapter 18

The crowd in front of the Concubines’ training hall seems to have tripled.  But it is still easy to spot Aimi’s shaven head amongst the others, black and brown, blonde and red.  Her eyes light up when she sees me approach, and she begins to grin, her mouth forming a question.

I drop my eyes.

She pushes through the crowd to me and grabs my arm.  “Li?  What happened?”

Overcome, I shake my head.  I have only barely regained any composure.  It has taken me twice as long to get ready for training as it should have because I have had to wait until my shaking stopped before I could remove my weapons and change my clothes.  And because I have had to twice wash the traces of tears from my face.  If I meet her eyes, see the concern there, I will lose whatever thin control I have gained.

Aimi puts her arm around me.  And I come undone.

Tears gather, hot and stinging in my eyes, and my breath thickens in my throat.  Aimi’s arm tightens around my shoulders.  She begins steering me through the crowd, toward the doors.

“Make way, please,” she says, with very un-Aimi-like authority.  “Training will begin in a few minutes.”

She closes the doors behind us firmly.  Then she takes my face in her hands and tilts my head up until she can see my eyes.  “What happened?  Toal said you were glowing this morning.  You looked so radiant it hurt his eyes.  What in Damalis’s name happened?”

I shake my head.  I can’t explain.

“Li!” she says sternly.  “I know you.  If you won’t tell me, you won’t tell anyone, and that means you’ll be bottling it up forever, so stop being stoic and tell me—”

“I gave him my vow,” I choke.

Her eyes widen, and she smiles brilliantly.  “You did?  That’s wonderful.  It’s what we’ve been hoping for—”

That unravels me completely.  Tears spill in acid runnels down my cheeks.  They bring no relief.  I need to do more than cry.  I need to scream, rage, explode with my grief.  But all I can manage is, “He didn’t want it.”

Aimi frowns.  “What—?”

“He didn’t want it.  He wouldn’t accept it.”

“That can’t be right.”  Aimi shakes her head.  “I’ve seen the way he looks at you.  And Toal said you were covered with marks this morning.”  She pauses and holds me at arms-length, looking at me closely.  “They _were_ love-marks, weren’t they?”

I nod miserably.

“Come over here,” she says, dragging me to the dais and sitting down with me on the bottom stair.  “Tell me exactly what happened.  He claimed you?”

I nod again, wiping at my burning eyes.

“And?”

“And it was wonderful.  It was everything you said it could be.” Thinking of it, remembering it, breaks my voice into harsh sobs.

Aimi puts her arm around my shoulders and pulls me to her until I lean my head against hers.  “The first time can make you a little emotional.  A little irrational.  Did you give him your vow right after?”

“No, no, this morning.  In the Great Hall.”

“In the Great Hall,” Aimi repeats, and I can hear surprise in her voice.  “That’s very . . . public.  Especially for you.  Why there?”

“I didn’t mean to!”  The words burst out of me in a torrent.  “The new commander brought his choice before the Lord Marshal, but she resisted and he put her in chains.  Lord Riddick questioned her and she said she wouldn’t be any man’s slave and then he had me tell her what it means to be a concubine and I was looking at the new statue of Zhylaw and thinking how different it is with him and I just . . . forgot myself.”

Aimi squeezes my shoulder.  “What did he say?  He didn’t reject you outright, did he?”

The memory brings a fresh burst of tears.  “He asked me what I said.  But it wasn’t what he said.  He felt – he felt anger and disgust.”

“Oh, Li, how do you know that?  You’re imagining it.  I told you, the first time can make you irrational—”

“I’m not irrational!” I snap.  “When he’s touching my Collar, I feel what he’s feeling.  He was _disgusted_.  He hates everything about us.  Why did I say anything?  I know how much he hates our ways.  I should have known it would repulse him.  And then he wouldn’t touch me—”

The memory of his rejection, of his withdrawal, renews the tearing pain in my chest.  I press my fingers against my breastbone to ease it.  But there is no ease.  The only ease I will find for this pain is in death.

Aimi reaches up to press my head against hers, a gesture that reminds me so much of the way the Beast sometimes holds me that I shudder.  “I’m sorry, Li,” she says.  “I’m so, so sorry.”

Her compassion wracks me, twists my chest further into a ragged, wet knot.  “I can’t bear it,” I whisper.  “I can’t bear it.”

“Of course not.  I tell you what you’re going to do.  You’re going to do what I did.  You’re going to go to him and tell him that you love him and that you’re his no matter what.  Even if he won’t give you his vow.  Sometimes with these thick-headed men you have to be the one who does all the giving.  Until they catch on.”

“I don’t love him!” I protest.

“Don’t be so blind, Li.  Would you be hurting this much if you didn’t?  I know you.  In four years with Zhylaw, the only time I ever saw you show any emotion was the day he put the Collar on you.  Lord Riddick’s pulled more emotion out of you in five minutes than Zhylaw did in four years.  So don’t tell me you don’t love him, because I know you do.  And don’t tell me that he didn’t hurt you, because I know he did.”

I choke.  That he hurt me, I won’t deny.

“I won’t pretend I understand why he was angry.  Maybe it wasn’t what he expected to hear.  Not all of us are as stiff with honor and duty as you are, you know.”

I take several ragged breaths.  “He hates it.  He hates even the mention of my duty.”

“Well, that’s probably it.”  She taps her finger against my forehead.  “I know that if I’d gone to Toal and told him that I’d honor and obey him instead of that I’d loved him for years and would die if I wasn’t with him, I wouldn’t be becoming his companion today.  Honestly, Li, sometimes you’re worse than a man.  Why didn’t you just tell him you loved him?”

I pull my knees to my chest and hunch over them miserably.  “I don’t know how.”

“ _I love you_.  How hard is that?”

I bump her with my elbow.  “You know what I mean.  And he doesn’t want to hear that I love him.”

“What in the ‘Verse would make you say that?”

“Because he’s—” A Beast.  And beasts have no need of love.  “Because he doesn’t need anyone or anything.  You don’t understand what he’s like, Aimi.  He’d laugh if I said I loved him.  He’d just see it as weakness.”

Aimi rubs her hand up and down my back, a gesture that reminds me of something she and Gennica and Iloru used to do when I first joined them.  When the Collar was first put on me and the skin of my back flaked and peeled away from the metal and no amount of healing could cure it.  Aimi and Gennica and Iloru used to take turns sitting with me and rubbing salve into my back, until my body finally accepted the Collar.  I’d forgotten that, repressed it as I’ve repressed so much else about my first days with Zhylaw.  Remembering brings a surge of affection for Aimi, and I lean into her.

“These warriors we’ve given ourselves to – they’re hard to love, aren’t they?” she says lightly.  “Why do we?”

I wipe at my drying tears and manage a small laugh.  “I don’t know.”

Aimi tugs my long braid.  “If you can’t tell him you love him, Li, at least tell him that you care about him.  Not because of your duty and honor and all of that crap.  Just because you do.  I guarantee that’s what he wants to hear.  Not that you’ll obey him ‘ _til UnderVerse come_.”

She says it in such a perfect imitation of Zhylaw’s dolorous tones that I have to laugh.  I turn and hug her.  “I’m the one who can’t do without you,” I say.  “What would I have done if I’d had to figure this out on my own?”

“I shudder to think.”  Aimi grins.  “Now, can I see these marks?  Everyone’s talking about them.”

“No!”

“Oh, come on.  You showed them off to the entire court.”  She hooks her finger over the collar of my tunic and tugs it away from my chest so she can peer down it.  “Damalis!  He likes to bite.”

“Aimi!”  I clap my hand against the front of my tunic.

Giggling, she lets it go.  “Toal does, too.  Shall I show you?”  She leans away from me and begins to pull down the waistband of her training uniform.

“No!”  I yank her hand away from her pants.  “Would you stop?”

“If you promise to ask Lord Riddick to bite you there.  You’ll love it.”  She laughs, that sweet, husky laugh of hers that must drive Toal mad.  “There, now that made you smile.  Oh, Li, I hate seeing you so unhappy.  This should be a wonderful day for you.  A special day.”

It’s supposed to be _her_ special day.  And she’s spending it comforting me.  I give her another hug, tighter, to show my gratitude.  “I shouldn’t have bothered you with this.  It’s your Day of Days.”

“Don’t be silly.  I’d have been furious if you kept this from me.  Now come on, tell me all about last night.  I want every detail.”

“Aimi,” I groan.  “You’re incorrigible.  And there must be fifty women waiting out in the hallway.  Where am I going to put them all?”

She rolls her eyes.  “So much for getting my own way on my Day of Days.  All right, I’ll let them in.  But I’m not letting you off that easy.  After training, I want _details_.”

She rises and moves toward the doors, giving me another minute to compose myself before I have to face so many strangers.  I smile after her.

 

As they file in, I see a surprising number of familiar faces amongst the crowd.  Sanjula takes a spot near the front of the hall.  She smiles nervously when she sees me look at her, and then more broadly when I return her smile without reservation.  I’m surprised to see her.  I assumed she and Daray would be celebrating their vows.  That she has appeared for training makes me think more of her.

Scalp-Taker’s concubines, Kanike and Ferona, stand a little behind Sanjula, and I remember Ferona’s request to be trained to serve at table.  If I am to train Sanjula, I can train Ferona as well.  I catch Ferona’s dark eyes and mouth, _See me later_.  She nods in response.

A smooth, blonde head moving through the crowd towards my right diverts me.  Gennica.

I catch Aimi’s eye, then glance at Gennica.  Aimi follows my gaze.  She is too polished a courtier herself to show any surprise on her face, but I see the faint tension of it ripple through her body.  She drifts towards the dais and leans against it, not far from where I sit on the top step.

“That does surprise me,” she murmurs.

“I haven’t seen Gennica since Lord Riddick dismissed her.  Have you?”

Aimi shakes her head fractionally.  “I thought she’d left the Basilica.  She has some family on the _Nikuna_.  I assumed she’d gone to them.  I can’t imagine why she’s here.  After what Zhylaw did to her, I never thought she’d want to be with another man.”

I glance at Aimi sharply.  “What?”

Aimi flushes guiltily and looks away.  She begins to drift back towards the spot where she usually stands during training, but I reach out and grab her arm.  “What do you mean?  Lord Zhylaw did nothing to any of us.”

She presses her lips together, then she takes a deep breath and says, “No, Li.  He did nothing to you.”

“What—?”  I begin, feeling my composure crumple again.  Zhylaw told me he was beyond the needs of the flesh.  Surely he did not lie outright to me?

“Ask me another time.  I don’t want to talk about it today.  But another time, I’ll tell you why I shaved my head,” Aimi whispers, her eyes on the sleek blonde in the crowd.  “And what he did to Gennica before he’d go to you to be bathed.”

“No,” I whisper.

Aimi shakes herself and stands a little straighter.  “It wasn’t your fault, Li.  Don’t go blaming yourself.  But don’t ask me to mourn that monster, either.  None of us should.”  She gives me a sharp glance and moves away.

Stunned, I rise unsteadily and look over the assembled women.

“Welcome,” I say, trying to fit words together inside my head, which feels like its flying apart.

Zhylaw lied to me.  He promised to cherish me, but he lied.  He told me he was beyond the needs of the flesh, but Aimi’s cryptic words can only mean that he used her, so badly that she cut her hair off rather than let him hurt her with it again.  And he used Gennica before coming to me every day for his chaste bath.  He lied to me.  He lied . . .

“Welcome everyone—” I begin again.

A hand goes up in the crowd.

“Yes?” I ask, startled.

“Lady Liaden, is it true?”

My head whirling, I peer into the crowd, trying to make out the speaker in the sea of unfamiliar faces.  “Is what true?”

“Did you kill the Purifier last night?  There’s a rumor that the Purifier and some others tried to assassinate the new Lord Marshal and that you—”

Finally understanding both her question and my sudden popularity, I nod.  The movement makes my head and the room spin.  I touch a finger to my temple to steady myself.  “Yes, it’s true.”

“Li,” says Aimi.  “Will you tell us how?”

Glancing at her, seeing her small smile, I have a feeling she already knows.  Toal has probably told her.  She simply likes to see me shine.  I smile at her gratefully.  I have always counted her my friend, but I had no idea how much she cared about me, and how much she shielded me from.

She’s right.  I’ve been blind.

“I used the weapons we practice with here.  My mind.  My body.  The deathshead pins.  When the assassins came, I distracted them from the Lord Marshal with my nakedness.”

That elicits a collective gasp that makes me smile weakly.

“Men are easily distracted by a woman’s nakedness,” I say.  “So remember it.  It can be a weapon like any other.”

“But, Lady,” the questioner, a woman in the plain uniform of a technician, says.  “How did you kill them?”

I rub my hand under my chin while I try to sort out that particular element from the blur of the night.  “While they were distracted, I drew close to them, close enough to drive my pins into their vulnerable places.  Throat and chest.”  I point to my own as a demonstration.  “They let me get close because they thought I was defenseless.  Because they thought I was weak and weaponless.  Because they underestimated me.  Men will always underestimate you.”  Except the Beast.  He does not underestimate me.  But he does not hold me in his heart, either.  How can I devote my life, my death, to a man who has no capacity for love?  “That is your greatest weapon.”

There is a collective hush, and then hands go up everywhere in the sea of faces.

I sigh.  This will be a long morning.

Wearily, I point to a hand and begin taking questions.

Most of their questions involve the use of the pins.  Tired of standing in one place and answering question after question until my brain swims, I finally wave Aimi up to the dais.

“Let me demonstrate,” I say in response to the question of what I would have done if the soldier had attacked me with blade or baton.  I hand Aimi a set of practice pins and pick up my own.  “Had any of them used a weapon against me, I could have used the pins defensively.  Like this.”

I nod at Aimi and she attacks.  I defend, countering each thrust with the pins, crossing them to show how they might be used to catch a blade.  Aimi is not a strong fighter, and her efforts are childlike in comparison to the Beast’s speed.  But they are more than enough for me this morning, when I feel so dizzy and drained.

Was anything about my life what I thought it was?  And what duty do I have to a man who lied to me again and again?

Aimi lunges at me unexpectedly and I fall back a step.  It is a bad movement, ill-considered and off-balance.  My back foot twists.  My head reels.

Aimi draws back a step, her eyes wide.  She’s never pushed me back before.  “Li, are you all right?”

“Fine.”  I shake myself, take a firmer grip on the pins, and nod her forward again.

Three more parries and I settle back into the familiar rhythm.  My body regains the flow of thrust and parry.  Except that my blood pounds in my ears, and black spots float at the edges of my vision.  My belly knots and I taste bile again.  Perhaps the Beast was right.  I should have eaten . . .

Aimi feints, jabbing at my right shoulder.  It is a move I should recognize.  I taught it to her.

But my thoughts move so slowly.  And too late, I see the real blow, coming in low, angling up towards my ribs.  I spin to block it, but I can’t seem to find my footing.  My feet tangle.  The room oscillates.

My braid, flying around me as I spin, slaps Aimi across the face.  I hear her cry.

Blinded, she does not see me fall into her blow, and I cannot stop myself.

The pin bites into my side, into the soft flesh above my hip.  I fall to my knees.  A hot trickle runs between my fingers when I clap my hand to my side.

Aimi screams.  “Li!”

The room flickers.  I can find no point of reference.  No constant light or sound on which to focus, to pull myself out of the grayness that eats my sight.

Aimi’s voice.  “Li, I’ll get a healer.”

I want to reassure her.  It is a training pin, without power, not long enough to reach a major organ.  If someone would remove the pin and bind the wound, I’d be fine.  If only I wasn’t so dizzy, so shaky, I would do it myself.  If only I could see, and everything wasn’t so gray and dim.

Voices tug at me.

“Here she is.  What should we do?  Should we send word to the Lord Marshal?”

“Yes, yes, send a guard, by all means.”  A soft, slithering voice.

The awareness of danger sparks through me, pulling me out of the gray haze.  I try to raise my head, but it feels impossibly heavy.  Lights dazzle my eyes when I open them.  I raise a hand to shade my eyes, but I can’t seem to reach my face.  Is this how the Beast feels when light blinds his sensitive eyes?

“I’ll take care of her now.  Here, give her some air.  Why don’t you show everyone out?  There, that’s better.”

I thrash my head.

No, don’t leave me alone with the snake.  A weapon, I need a weapon.  Even if I have to draw it from my own flesh.  I grope for the pin in my side.

“No, no,” the snake whispers.  “You’ll only make it worse.”

Tearing, stabbing pain rips through my stomach.  Aimi’s thrust didn’t bite this deep.

“You see?  Let me help you.”

Another tearing pain.  I have to get away from her.  I try to roll, my hands scrabbling across the smooth stone of the dais.

Pressure on my throat, choking, cutting of my precious air.  I can barely breathe through the pain and dizziness and now she denies me what little breath I have.  “Hold still, Liaden,” she says.  “The more you resist, the longer this will take.”

No!  I will not die before my Due Time!  I will choose the time and place of my death.  I will not let anyone choose for me.  Especially not Vaako’s snake.

My hand finds the head of the pin she has driven into my stomach.  Yanking it out of my flesh, I flail at her.  It is a bad blow.  Weak and undirected.  But she does not expect it.  Fabric tears.  The pin sinks into something soft and yielding.

She screams.

I try to roll over, to get up onto my knees, to get away from the blinding lights and the stabbing pain and the terrible buzzing in my ears.

_Hold on, Liaden.  I’m coming._

I shake my head, trying to clear it, to focus.  Where is she?

A slither.  Somewhere behind me.  She always writhes before she attacks.  “Liaden, if you would stay still, this would be over quickly.  You can’t get away.  I will keep what I kill today.”

A soft snick.  Edged metal on polished cloth.

And then, footsteps.  Running footsteps.

“Get away from her!”  Aimi’s voice.

A hiss.  A slither.  A scream.

Aimi?

Finally, finally, I manage to roll onto my front.  To get my hands under me.  And get away from the glare of the lights overhead.

Blinking, retching dryly with pain and weakness, I get my bearings.  A red-robed healer stands at the bottom of the dais, mouth agape at the scene before him.  The snake draws back from something lying near my feet, a bloody dagger in her hand.

Aimi.  Lying sprawled on the cold stone.  Her eyes wide, unblinking.  All light and laughter gone from her face.

“Unfortunate,” the snake says, rearing over me, raising her dagger again.  “And on her Day of Days.”

A bloody flash as the dagger descends.  Rending pain across my back.  Metal scraping against bone.

Screaming soundlessly, I reach back, grasping vainly for the knife in my back.  My wrist brushes cold metal.

The Rift.

I fumble, my fingers tangling in my loosened hair.  Then my hand closes around the clasp and I tear it free.  Slamming the clasp against the stone under my hands, I shatter the jewel.

And unleash the Rift.

A tormented howling fills the room.  The Void.  A terrible, terrifying sound.  But a sound familiar to me from hours of secret, solo practice.  I am not afraid.  It is my weapon to wield if my heart is pure and my will is strong.

I will not fail.  I will not Fall.  I will not die before my Due Time.

I force the Rift open, towards the snake.

She screams, high and thin, a thread of sound barely audible over the hideous baying of the Rift.  Her screams warp, stretching and shredding, as the Rift pulls first her soul and then her body into the Void.

Her voice is not sweet.  And I take no pleasure in her screams.

The snake falls silent as the Void sucks down the ashy dregs of her soul.  With the last of my will, I close my mind around the Rift, shrinking it ever smaller, silencing the voices that call to me to join them, until I can close my fingers around it again.  Shards flutter across my palm as the jewel reforms, and the Rift closes.  In silence, I clutch it to my breast.

The cool touch on my shoulders.  “It’s all right now.  I’ll take care of you.”

“Aimi—”

“She’s beyond my help, Lady Liaden.  Lie still.  Let me heal you.”

I give myself over to those cool hands, to the chill rush that runs under my skin, soothing away my pain and sinking me into blackness.

 

“Where is she?”

The Beast’s voice.  Swimming up out of darkness, I open my eyes.

Aimi’s blank, glazed eyes stare into mine.

I reach for her.  My hand twitches.  So weak.  I squeeze my eyes shut and focus.  Less than a meter.  I drag myself forward, my fingernails snapping on stone.  The kneeling healer, lost in his trance, provides a handhold.  Tears blind me instead of the lights.  Wetness under my palm.  When I lift my hand, my fingers are smeared with red.  Aimi.

I pull myself over Aimi’s body, whispering to her.  “It was supposed to be me . . . you weren’t supposed to go now.  You were supposed to stay . . . and love Toal . . .”

Rough hands close on my shoulders.  Yank me to my feet.  The world spins.

“Liaden?” His voice catches on my name.  His heavy hand, clamped on my shoulder, holds me upright, while he tears open my tunic with the other.  I try to push him away, but I have no strength.

His hand splays over my side, fingers sticking in the drying blood.  He examines me carefully, side and belly and back, as though he knows exactly where I was wounded.  Then he wraps his bloodied hand around my throat and tilts my head up with his thumb.

“Look at me,” he says softly.

I meet his eyes, and see the concern that darkens his eyes nearly to black.  Was he afraid . . . for me?  “Aimi—”

His mouth tightens, but his eyes lighten to glacial blue.  “You’re okay.”

“No, Aimi—” My voice breaks.

“Come here.”  He pulls me toward him, enveloping me first in his arms and then in his entire body, chest and shoulders and belly and thighs.  I stand stiffly in his embrace, torn between accepting the comfort he offers and returning to Aimi’s side.

Then I breathe in his smell, musk and sweat, and something inside me breaks.  His scent reaches down inside me, down to the core of pain that purification never touched, and unlocks it.  I begin to cry, softly at first, and then grief tears through me, more painful than any stab-wound, and my cries become hard, wrenching sobs.

The Beast holds me, his hands moving in my hair, down my spine, stroking me over and over as he tries to soothe me.  I cannot be consoled.  My grief breaks out of me in a long cry.  “Aimi!”

With a whispered curse, he picks me up.  Holding me tight to his chest, he carries me through the Great Hall, up the stairwell and into the sanctum.

Without letting me go, he climbs onto our bed.  He sits back against the headboard and holds me away from him for a moment while he finishes tearing open my tunic.  I am too distraught, too undone, to even protest as he bares my breasts.  He tugs his own tunic off over his head.  Then he pulls me close, skin against skin, and wraps the fur around us.

“Tell me what happened.”

I shake my head.  I cannot.  I cannot admit my failing.  When he realizes that I am to blame for Aimi’s death, he will not want to comfort me.  He will send me from him.  And I deserve no better.  It’s my fault that Aimi is dead.

“Liaden,” he says gently.  “Look at me.”

“No, please . . .”

He catches my head in his hands and holds me still while he peers into my eyes.  “Tell me.”

Slowly, forcing each word through my raw throat with an effort, I admit my failing.

His hands fall away from my face when I tell him how I fell into Aimi’s blow.  He lifts his head and focuses on the far wall of the sanctum, staring at the grim Conquest Icon that glowers down on us.  His eyes go distant when I come to Dame Vaako’s treachery and Aimi’s death, and my voice finally breaks.

“I told you,” he growls, low and hard.  “Told you you were no good to me if you passed out from hunger.  Danger to me.  Danger to yourself.”  Rage runs through him, turns the muscles under my cheek and hands to iron.  I cannot bear to look at his face any longer, but I know his eyes will have chilled to disks of white ice.  “You wouldn’t listen.  Now your friend’s dead and you coulda died with her.  Next time I give you an order _you will fucking listen to me_.”

He doesn’t roar at me.  But he doesn’t need to.  I can feel his rage, beating down on me like a thousand invisible fists.

I curl away from him, into a ball of misery and grief and guilt.

“ _Fuck_.”  His arms come back around me.  “Liaden.”

I shake, wracked with sorrow and shame.  He _blames_ me.  And I deserve his blame.  If I had listened to him.  If I had not been so stubborn, so fixed on my duty to a man who deserved nothing from me or any of those who served him, Aimi would be alive.  She would be laughing and pressing me for details of my night with the Beast and telling me which dress she decided on for her union ceremony with . . . Toal.

“I have to tell Toal,” I whisper hoarsely.

“ _We’ll_ tell Toal.  When you’re up to it.”  He begins stroking my hair again and the comfort of it, of being held so close and so warm, touched so soothingly, when Aimi lies cold and dead, breaks my heart apart again.

He holds me, rocking me a little, while I weep. 


	19. Chapter 19

He will not let me go, not even to do what must be done.  After the storm of my grief subsides, he picks me up and carries me over to the desk.  He arranges me on his lap, keeping me pressed against his chest with one hand, while he summons Toal back from the _Dys_.  He keeps the blue lens blanked, issuing oral orders only, shielding me from the sight of the men he commands, while he speaks to the Dys’ captain, and then his guard to order Vaako’s arrest.

He passes his hand over the lens and puts both arms around me before settling back into the chair.  Winding his fingers in my hair, he says quietly, “Think he had anything to do with it?”

“Commander Vaako?” I wipe my eyes with the back of my hand.  “No.  I think she saw an opportunity.”

An opportunity _I_ gave her. 

“To strike at me,” the Beast says grimly.

“At you?”  I look up at him, puzzled.  I had not thought of it that way.  “I think she saw an opportunity to take my place at your side.”

“How’s that?”

I sniffle and wipe my face again.  “Killing the Lord Marshal’s concubine is the one sure way to become one.  She’s tried it before.”

The Beast stares down at me, a small frown wrinkling his brow.  Then he nods.

“You keep what you kill.”  He tugs on a strand of my hair.  “What about Vaako?”

“A companion only.  Their ties may be severed.”

“Not like yours.”

 _In life.  In Death.  ‘Til UnderVerse come_.  I have vowed it, and I am true to my vows.

“No, not like mine.”

He sighs and rests his chin on the top of my head.  I can feel him thinking, contemplating, but without him feeding me his thoughts through the Collar, I cannot guess what he ponders.

“Before Toal gets here, I want you to eat something.”

He gave me until tonight.  But after all that has happened, after all I have learned, I can’t bring myself to argue with him.  Zhylaw did not deserve the honor I gave him.  Why didn’t I see it for myself?

“Yes, Lord.”

He reaches forward to pass his hand over the lens again, says a few words to Chef, and closes the channel.  “C’mon, Liaden.”

He sets me on my feet and stands.  Taking my hand, he leads me through the sanctum and into the Chamber of the Bath.

When we reach the middle bath, he releases my hand.  Befuddled, I stare at him.  It is not time for his bath, and although I know he cares little for the Lord Marshal’s daily protocol, this does not seem the time . . .

“Get in,” he says gently.

“Lord?”

He nods at my stomach.  “You’re covered in blood.”

I glance down at myself in surprise.  He’s right, of course.  Blood has dried to a brown glaze on my belly and side.  My back must be covered, too.  As I pay attention to it, my skin begins to itch.  “Forgive me—”

“Save it for Toal.  Get in.”

 _Toal_.  What am I going to say to Toal?

I shed my trousers and boots slowly while I turn the terrible question over in my head.  When I reach up to loosen my blood-sticky braid, I feel the absence of the Rift clasp.

I glance around, even though I know it could not have gotten to the Chamber by itself.  Where is it?  Where did I leave it?  How could I have been so careless?

“What’s wrong, Liaden?”

“The clasp for my hair—”

“The Rift?  It’s on the bed.”

How did he know what it’s called?  Does he realize what it does?

He says nothing more, giving me no indication of how much he knows, or how he knows it.  Instead, he rounds the bath, moving towards the hidden cupboard where I keep the bathing supplies.  I trail after him uncertainly.

“In,” he says.  He slides open the concealed door and peers inside.

“Yes, my Lord . . .”  What is he doing?  Surely he doesn’t intend to fetch me soap?  “Please, let me do that.”

Standing with his back to me, he shakes his head.  “You ever gonna call me Riddick?”

My shoulders slump and I bow my head.  I cannot seem to please him for more than a few moments.  And now I have failed him utterly.  What will Toal say when he learns that I’m responsible for Aimi’s death?  What will he do?  I must make it right somehow.

But there is nothing I can say or do to make up for Aimi’s loss.

A sponge slides under my chin and tilts my head up.  The Beast gives me a gentle smile, then bats my chin with the sponge.  “Thought I told you to get in.”

His kindness propels me backwards.  Meekly, I step into the bath.  Sinking down onto my knees, I begin to rub at the dried blood on my stomach.

With a small splash, the Beast slides into the bath behind me.  He stretches his long legs to either side of me and pulls me back into his lap.  After wetting the sponge in the warm water, he rubs it up and down my back.  The motion is as gentle and soothing as his caresses.  Pink ripples spread away on either side of us.

He should not be bathing me.

“This not proper—”  I protest half-heartedly.

He chuckles.  “‘Bout time I got to give you a bath.”

He cares no more for our rituals than he does for his title.  His casual disregard of the things that have meant so much to me should hurt.  But in the face of all the other losses I have suffered over this day, and the agonizing truths I have learned, it is painless.  There is something . . . liberating about it.  About the idea that I do not need to observe the rigid protocols of Concubine and Lord Marshal each and every moment with him.

I relax into his embrace and let him wash me.  The touch of the water, the glide of the sponge over my skin, are soothing, sensuous.

Guilt drenches me.  I should not be soothed, or aroused, when Aimi lies died.

“What’s wrong?”

“I was thinking of Aimi.”

“Mmm.”  Even his deep grumble is soothing.  “She a good friend?”

I realize then that, of course, the Beast has no way of knowing what Aimi meant to me.  Other than knowing that Toal chose her as his companion, he probably doesn’t even know who Aimi is.

Was.

“My only friend.”

He makes a low, amused sound.  “Should I be insulted?”

I start.  Does he think of me as a friend?  He is my lord, my master, my lover.  Is there room in any of those things for friendship?  Perhaps, in his mind, there is.

Perhaps, in my mind, there should be.

“Are you my . . . friend, Lord?”

“Could be if you’d call me Riddick.”

Is that why he insists on me calling him by his name?  “I have served for eleven years,” I say, trying to make him understand.  “It’s all I know.”

He runs the sponge down my front, between my breasts.  “Wasn’t once.”

There’s no blood on my breasts, and I try to divert the sponge to where it will do more good.  But he refuses to be diverted.  He circles the sponge over my nipple, bringing it immediately to a hard peak.  A rill of heat shoots down into my belly.

“Riddick—”

“Yeah?”  His voice has dropped: deep, husky, pleased.

“There’s no blood there.”

“True.”  He chuckles.  “Lie back.  There’s some in your hair.”

I slide down into the warm water.  He lifts his knees and I settle naturally against him, my head on his stomach, my arms draped over his thighs.  His hands move through my hair, tugging gently as he unravels my braid.  There is such comfort in this.  In having him hold me and tend me.  Is this the way he feels when I take care of him?

“You got more friends than you think, Liaden,” he says softly.

He doesn’t understand how it has been for me.  Having to hold myself aloof for fear of showing anyone favor.  Having to ignore any overture along with every slight.  I haven’t been able to risk befriending anyone outside the tight circle of the Lord Marshal’s concubines.  And neither Gennica nor Iloru ever showed any interest in being my friend.  “Why do you say that?”

“’Cause of the parade of people who appeared after you left this morning.  Half the Armada showed up to plead your case to me.”

I try to sit up, to look at him and gauge his expression, but he tugs me back down by my hair.  “I don’t understand.”

“Neither did I at first.”

I rub my hand across my eyes.  He’s speaking in riddles, and I am too drained by grief and hunger and confusion to follow his twisted logic.  “Please, Riddick.”

He squeezes out the mass of my hair and drapes it over my shoulder, then his arms circle me loosely.  “After you left, everyone from that old healer to some girl named Nazya showed up to talk to me.”  He traces the curve of my upper arm lazily with his thumb.  “Nazya stuttered so badly I had to ask her five times what she wanted.”

“She is a Servant of the Chamber,” I say slowly, trying to make sense of what he’s said.  “She’s very shy, even with me.  She’s probably never had cause to appear in the Great Hall before, much less speak to the Lord Marshal.  What did she want?”

“Same thing as the others.”

Now he’s doing it deliberately, and I’m too tired, too hollowed by grief, to play his games.  “Which was?” I ask wearily.

“To make sure I understood what you’d said to me.  What it meant.”

My vow.  My heart falters.  “And my Lord Marshal said?”

“Call me Riddick an’ I’ll tell you.”

More of his games.  How can something that means so much to me be nothing more than a bargaining chip to him?  “Riddick, please.”

“Said I understood.”

He did?  He does?  “Would you—” I falter, afraid of what I’m about to ask.  Afraid of feeling his anger and disgust again.  But I need to know if he truly understands.  “Would you touch my Collar?”

He doesn’t answer, and for a moment I fear I’ve presumed too much.  Then his hand slides up between my breasts to spread warmly across the links of the Collar.

 _Fear_.

His fear closes my throat, sealing it and snatching my breath away.  I gasp down humid, heated air, but it does not help me breathe.  Fear fills my lungs with ash.  He gives me the face of his fear, and it is my face.  Half-hidden behind blood-soaked strands of my hair as I crawl across the training room dais towards Aimi’s body.  There is blood everywhere.  So much blood.  Smeared on my arms, streaked on my tunic, pooled on the floor.  He must have thought I was dying.

He _did_ think I was dying.  The Collar gave him my terror and pain, but not the healing.  He was so shocked to open my tunic and find me healed that he could barely hold me upright.

His hand slides away, and his arms tighten around me.  “That what you wanted?” he asks softly.

No, but it is enough.  He cares enough to fear losing me.  And that is enough for now.

I lie back against him and turn my face into the warm, damp column of his neck.  “Forgive me,” I whisper.

“For what?”

“For scaring you.”

He’s silent for so long that I wonder if I’ve said the wrong thing.  If acknowledging his fear is too much of a blow to his pride.  Then he says, deep and soft, “Don’t do it again.”

I wrap my arms around his and close my eyes.

 

“Liaden.”  His deep voice rouses me out of doze.  I am warm and safe, held tightly within the circle of his arms.  Comforted against the emptiness in my belly and in my heart . . .

Aimi.

I sit upright suddenly, sloshing water around us.  “I’m sorry.  I didn’t mean to fall asleep.”

“S’okay.”  His fingertips trail down my back.  “Toal’ll be here soon.  We oughta get dressed.”

I nod, but make no move to get out of the bath.  I draw my knees to my chest and rest my forehead on them.  “What am I going to say to him?” I wonder aloud.

“I’ll do it,” he says roughly.

“No.”  I shake my head, the ends of my hair swishing in the water.  “It’s my fault.  I will take the blame.”

His hands close on my shoulders.  He squeezes gently, then propels me up and out of the bath.  “We’ll see.  Let’s go.”

In the sanctum, he follows me into the wardrobe and shakes his head when I reach for a tunic.  “Just a robe.  We’re not gonna be up long.”

What does he mean?  It is mid-morning.  Surely he does not intend to return to bed?

Bewildered but obedient, I drape him in a robe.  When I kneel to put slippers on him, I realize I have not tended his feet.  I touch the wet bandages hesitantly.

“Leave ‘em.  They’re fine.”

The soaked wrappings will do his sores no good.  “At least let me unwrap them.”

He nods and I strip off the bandages carefully.  His feet are almost healed.  Even the weeping blister on his heel has dried to a circle of hard scab.  I slide the slippers onto his feet with a faint smile.  If I have accomplished nothing else in the past two days, I have given him this small comfort.

As I rise, he catches my hand.  He runs his thumb across one of my broken fingernails.  “Who takes care of you, Liaden?”

“I take care of myself.  I’ll trim that now so it doesn’t catch you.”

He flicks the ragged edge.  “You don’t have anyone to help you.”

“There are many Servants of the Chamber.  They do whatever I ask.”

“Mmm.”  A high noise.  Disbelieving.  Or non-committal.  I cannot tell which.  But he says nothing more, merely follows me into my chamber and watches while I draw on my own robe.

When I turn from my closet, he has picked up a brush from my dressing table.  He beckons me with two fingers.

He wants to brush my hair?  My scalp prickles at the thought.

“I’ll do that, my Lord.”

“Humor me.”

Sighing resignedly, I sit down in the vanity chair in front of him.  Perhaps he will tire of the task quickly and let me finish the job.  Before he tears all of my hair out.

His fingers slide against my neck, and lifts the damp mass of my hair so he can work the brush over the tips.  He uses short strokes, working the tangles out of the ends before moving upwards.  The way I brush my hair.  He is so gentle, I feel only the faintest tugging.  I stare at his reflection in the mirror in front of me in amazement.  Has he watched me so closely that he knows how I care for my hair?

He lifts a hank of hair to his face, rubs it against his cheek and inhales deeply.  “Couldn’t believe when I saw you were hiding this.”

“A Concubine reserves her true glory—”

“Yeah, you said.  What else you been hidin’, Liaden?”

“What do you mean?”  I meet his silver gaze in my mirror.

“Why don’t you think you got any friends?”

I bow my head.  “I cannot afford to show any favoritism among the courtiers.  You’ve seen how they scheme.”

He runs his fingertips through my hair, pulling my head up.  “Yeah, I’ve seen.”  He gathers my hair in one hand and brushes the entire length, roots to tips, with strokes so gentle, so sensuous, they resound through my core.  “Then why’d eighteen people line up to talk to me this morning?”

I don’t know.  I shake my head, and he lets my hair slide through his fingers to fan around my shoulders.  “I’m sorry they bothered you with such trivialities, my Lord.”

“Didn’t say it was trivial.”  He spears his hands through my hair and draws them apart so the damp strands run like black water between his fingers.  “They didn’t think so, either.  Why d’you?”

I have no answer.  I can’t imagine what motivated Tomoetu or Nazya or any of the others to speak to the Beast on my behalf.  It has been so long since anyone defended me, fought for me, that the very idea is alien.

He smoothes the long fall of hair down my back.  “When Toal gets here, I want you kneeling next to me.  I’ll do the talking.”

“But I should—”

“Thought you swore to obey me, Liaden.  That gonna start anytime soon?”

If there was any weight to his tone, it would bow me down in shame.  But there’s none.  He’s teasing me, as he always does.  Amusement concealing the more serious note beneath.

It is not a game I know how to play.  But I am learning.

“But you did not accept my vow,” I say lightly.

A pause.  I glance into the mirror to gauge his expression.  He does not meet my gaze, his eyes following his hands as he strokes my hair.

“That what you want, Liaden?”

In a heartbeat, the game has turned serious.  Although his hands are on my hair, not my Collar, I can feel his reluctance.  He does not want to accept my vow, or give me his.  He wants something else.  Aimi was right.  He does not want to hear about honor or duty.  He wants the truth of what is between us.  But I’m not ready to admit what I feel for him.  Not now.  Not with Aimi’s death hanging heavy in the air and Toal on the way.

“No, Riddick.”

A deep noise.  “Where’s that leave us?”

“I’m yours.  For as long as you will have me.”

His eyes snap up and meet mine in the mirror.  “Longer than tomorrow,” he says, half a question and half a statement.

“For as long as you will have me,” I repeat.

He reaches around the flanges and spines of my chair and draws me up.  Brushing my damp hair away from my eyes, he looks down at me intently.  “You’ll stay with me?  Wherever I go?”

To the Threshold, and beyond.  “Yes, Riddick.”

He sighs deeply, and tucks me into his chest.

 

When Toal arrives, I am kneeling on the cold stone next to the Beast.  He stands still, his stance balanced and easy, outwardly relaxed.  But I know he has Manoj and Marened within easy reach.  With his hand cupped around the back of my head, his fingers splayed down my neck to rest on my Collar, he feeds me his concern.

Had I not felt his fear over losing me, I would have said he fears nothing.  Certainly he fears neither pain nor death.  Both are old companions.  But he is concerned.  Concerned that Aimi’s death will undermine Toal’s loyalty.  Concerned that Toal will demand something he is unwilling to give in compensation.  Concerned that if he has to kill Toal and name another new commander, he will lose his tenuous control over Vaako, Scales and Scalp-Taker.

I glance up at him.  I have caused this concern.  I should take the blame and suffer Toal’s reproof.  But he will not let me.  He fights for what is his.  He always has.  It is all he knows.  And he has claimed me as his own, as much as I have given myself to him.  He smiles gently at me, then directs his attention to the door as Toal strides in.

Toal drops into an obeisance.  When he rises, the Beast wastes no time.

“Aimi’s been killed.”

The Beast catches Toal, his hands on the commander’s wide shoulders, when Toal staggers.

He holds Toal upright while he tells the commander of Dame Vaako’s treachery and Aimi’s death.  Each word falls on my head like a hammer blow, bowing me down.  The collective weight of his words keeps me doubled-over even after he finishes.

The two men are silent for such a long time that I finally glance up into their faces, wondering what passes between them.  Toal’s face is wet, tears carving shining lines down his charcoal skin.  The Beast holds him steadily, his hands on Toal’s shoulders, not looking away, not flinching in the face of Toal’s pain.  The Beast’s face is drawn into tight creases, and his eyes are as expressive, as sad, as I have ever seen them.

Toal finally looks down at me.  “Aimi would have been proud—”  He chokes and his face works.  “Proud to have died protecting you.  We’ll see her again.  She’ll wait for us at the Threshold.”

I thought I had no more tears.  I thought I had cried myself dry.  But I was wrong.  Toal’s words tear open the barely-formed scabs on my heart and start it bleeding afresh.

I put my hands to my face and weep for what we have all lost.  Aimi.  Her light and her laughter and her loving heart.

The promise of seeing her again at the Threshold should be enough to assuage my grief.  But it is not.  No one truly knows what awaits us there.  Will Aimi be there?  Will she wait for us?  Will she still be the same Aimi I love and miss so terribly?  Or will the dark glory of the UnderVerse change her, change us all?  The purifiers cannot answer those questions, and my doubts undermine any solace the Faith offers.

The Beast offers me a simpler comfort.  He says a few words to Toal, and when the commander turns and leaves, the Beast kneels next to me and gathers me in his arms.  He holds me against his chest for a moment, then picks me up and carries me the few short steps to the bed.  There, he curls up with me as he did before, his back against the headboard, his arms and legs around me, cradling and comforting me while I cry into his neck.

Where my Faith leaves me only doubt, the Beast’s compassion gives me true relief.  When my tears finally stop, I feel a fragile sense of peace.

The Beast stirs, his hand contracting in my hair instead of stroking me the way he has while I’ve been crying.  “How’re you doin’?” he asks, his voice deep and gentle.

I wipe my eyes on my robe and nod against his shoulder.

“Think you could eat?”  He tips his chin toward the door.

I glance around in surprise.  So lost in my grief, I did not notice anyone come and go.  But a hover table laden with food waits patiently by the door.  Now that I see it, smell it, my stomach cramps with sharp and sudden longing.  I’m so very hungry.

“Yes.”

The Beast unwraps himself from around me with a whispered, “Be right back.”

He crosses the room, guides the table back to the bed, and then slides in behind me, stretching his legs to either side of mine.

“What do you want first?” he asks.

I reach for a skewer of red and yellow fruit sticking out of a crystal bowl.  He bats my hand away.  “Uh-uh.”

I look up at him, bemused.  Is he going to tease me with the promise of food and then deny me?

“I get to feed you,” he says, picking up the skewer I reached for.

I shake my head.  The bath was one thing, and brushing my hair seemed to give him pleasure, but this is another.  “It’s not right that you serve me.”

“Like I give a fuck.  You want this?”

I nod desperately.  Now that I’ve accepted the idea of breaking my fast, not doing so would be unbearable.

“Then I get to feed you.”

Too drained to protest any further, I open my mouth.  He inserts the skewer carefully, and draws it back between my teeth.  Imiree and saurin and sweet citrus layer across my tongue.  My favorite fruits.

I glance at the table and find it covered with my favorite dishes.  Besides the bowl of mixed fruit there are the black sausages that Chef makes only for the Lord Marshal’s table.  Spiced eggs.  Tiny flatcakes filled with cream and silverfruit.  Slivers of roasted meat garnished with guerka sauce.  Chef’s thick, red stew that hides its fiery pepper aftertaste behind the sweetness of paprika and cream.  Boiled crawlish, their huge claws cracked open and glistening with flavored oil.  A pitcher of Cark.  And an insulated bowl of gingered ice, garnished with guerka leaves.

I swallow the mouthful of fruit so I don’t choke on my surprise.

“How did Chef do all this?”  I wonder aloud, not expecting the Beast to answer me.  The flatcakes alone take a day to rise and proof before they’re baked.  The crawlish had to be caught and marinated.  The stew requires hours to cook down to that perfect caramelized fire.  How could Chef have managed all of these time-consuming dishes in the short span of time that I have bathed and grieved?

But the Beast has an answer.  “My guess?  I wasn’t the only one waitin’ for you to start eating.  Told you you got more friends than you think.”

“How long have you known?”

“Since the first night.  I lay awake listening to your stomach rumble.”

He _has_ indulged me, more than I ever guessed.  Mortified, I hunch between his legs.  But he will not let me draw away.  With his huge arm, he keeps my back pressed against his chest.

“Here, those look good.”  The Beast spreads open a crawlish claw with his fingers and gathers some of the white meat.  Cupping his hand so the oil drips into his palm, he slides it into my mouth.  He licks his fingers, then takes a bite himself.  “Mmm.  Gotta remember those.”

“Crawlish,” I say quietly.  “From Aquila.  We breed them in the pond in my garden.”

“Show me.”  The Beast nuzzles my hair.  “Tomorrow.”

Tomorrow.  Two days ago, I had not thought I’d live to see tomorrow.  Now he and I make plans for it.  Together.

“Maybe Natane and her cub will be out of the den.”  I lean back against him and take another bite of crawlish when he offers it.  “Have you thought of a name for the cub?”

A baritone rumble.  “No.  You?”

I nod hesitantly.  “Ctyren.  It means ‘shield.’  But it is a Daixian name and I—”

“I like it.”

Smiling, I settle more comfortably against him and let him feed me.  He offers me a taste of each dish, sampling them himself.  The stew’s spice catches him by surprise, making him cough and growl in annoyance.

Hearing that familiar noise, not directed in anger at me for the first time in hours, draws a small laugh out of me.  And once I start laughing, I can’t stop.  I laugh with relief.  Relief that he has not sent me away or punished me for failing him.  Relief that Toal has not turned on him in rage and vengeance.  Relief that he has not truly rejected me, but only waits for me to tell him what I feel instead of hiding behind ritual and ceremony.  And finally, with relief that I have survived, despite Dame Vaako’s best attempts.  I laugh with the sheer delight of being alive.

He joins me, chuckling softly, and when my laughter dies down, he offers me a goblet of Cark to moisten my throat.

“You had enough?”

I sip the Cark and nod.  My stomach, shrunken from two days of fasting, is comfortably full.

He takes the Cark when I offer it to him, drinks and sets it back on the table.  Then he pushes the table away from the bed with his foot.  His warm hands settle on my shoulders, smooth down to my elbows.  With a soft susurrus of cloth, he bunches his hands and pulls my robe off my shoulders.

“Time for dessert.”

 

He stretches me across the fur coverlet, opening my robe so he can look at me, gazing on my nakedness as though I were a rare delicacy.  The intensity of his expression would be frightening if I was not growing accustomed to it.  If it did not mirror my own.

He leans over me, setting his hands gently to my throat, just above the Collar.  His fingers splay across my skin, ten points of heat.  Then he draws his hands downward.  The Collar ignites when his fingers pass over it.  A circle of black fire pulses around us in a ring, filling the room with its unlight.  Ribbons of flame follow his fingertips down over my skin, leaving behind the lingering sense of his touch.  My nipples peak before he ever caresses them.  My belly trembles, tight with anticipation.  And in my core, liquid heat swirls, ready for the deep touch that will bring it to the boil and give me the release I already crave.

My body arches to him, bowing up off the bed.  His eyes follow my motion, heavy lids and thick black lashes shuttering his argent stare, so I cannot see the expression in them.  But I can see the small smile that curves his mouth.  And I can feel his satisfaction at my response.

 _Liaden_.

My name in his mind.  In my mind.  I can feel him thinking about me, focusing his attention tighter and tighter.  All other concerns –

_Toal_

_Rebellion on the Dys_

_Vaako_

_The Threshold_

_Varkony_

_The Galinites_

_The Purifier_

– recede as his mind narrows down to my body under his hands.

When he reaches the cradle of my hips, he presses down, rolling my thighs apart and rubbing his thumbs up and down my mound.

“Lift your knees, Liaden.”

I pull my knees up, and then part them in the position he ordered me into before, with the soles of my feet touching and my legs spread.

His eyes catch fire, burning in the shadows of the bed.  He bends over me and I hear him inhale, once, again, as though my scent is as enticing as my form.

He growls, deep and pleased.

“Arms up.  Hold on.”  He nods at the bedpost behind me, at the foot of the bed.  I shift until I can stretch up and reach it.  My hands lock around it.  Splayed and wholly vulnerable, I lie back and wait for his touch.

 _Mine_.

He lowers his head and touches his mouth to my thigh.  His lips sear my skin, but his kiss is light, gentle, and it is not what I crave.  Aimi said I would love it if he bit me there, and she was right about so many things . . .

“Would you—would you bite me there?”

An impossibly deep noise.  And his teeth sink into my thigh.

The pain is exquisite.  It bows my back and forces the air out of my lungs on a keening wail.

He bites his way up into the soft hollow of my groin, following the long tendon.  I writhe with each bite.  My body contracts at the pain, relaxes with the ensuing rush of pleasure.  Each bite pushes me closer and closer to the edge, and he hasn’t even entered me.

He moves up onto the plane of my hip, avoiding that place where I most want him.  His teeth close hard on the point of bone, just shy of breaking the skin.  The hot, wet brush of his tongue follows his teeth, laving and tasting.

 _Salt.  Skin.  Sweetness_.

He lifts his head and looks at me for a moment.  His quicksilver gaze slides over my body, stretched before him, and I see again that male satisfaction.  The pride and pleasure of the dominant animal.  He reaches between my legs and pinches my labia together with his fingers.  Lowering his head, he bites down.

I scream.  I cannot keep still.  I thrash under him even though his teeth are embedded in my most delicate flesh.

The tip of his tongue slides between his teeth, pushing into the groove of my body, stroking the enflamed membranes within.  My thighs and belly and internal muscles contract wildly.

The sharpness of his teeth leaves me just before I fly apart.  I jolt, my hands clawing up the post.

He rises up over me.  His big, warm hands lift my hips.  Then he surges into me.

I scream again.

But he doesn’t bring me.  He thrusts deep, seating himself, driving his thickness to my core.  But just before my body boils over, he stops moving.  Holding himself above me, his huge biceps flexing, he positions me, lifting one knee and then the other around his hips.  I whimper at his restraint, even as my body responds to his positioning, locking down around him.

“Hold on to my wrists,” he rumbles.  “Look at me.”

I give him what he wants.  The expression in my eyes as he begins to move in me and my body finally goes over the edge.  The frantic need that changes to ecstasy.  Each deep surge rends me, tears through self and soul, to shatter me completely.

Releasing his wrists, I reach up and wrap my arms around his neck, pulling my shoulders off the bed, pressing my breasts to his chest, bringing my face so close to his that I can feel the scorching heat of his skin, the feathery brush of his breath across my mouth, when I whisper, “I love you.”

He freezes.

Fear sheets down my spine, shriveling my climax just as it swells so taut my skin cannot contain it.

“Say it again,” he says hoarsely.

I fall back onto the bed with relief.  Aimi was right.  This is what he wanted to hear.

“I love you.”

“Again.”  He punctuates the word with a hard thrust.  My body engages his again, squeezing down around him.

“I love you.”

Another ferocious thrust.  “Again.”

“I love you.”

He demands I say it over and over, until I’m screaming the words through my long-delayed climax.  He roars his release, drowning my voice, and collapses on me, leaving me with no breath to speak.  But still I mouth the words silently, lost in the shuddering aftermath.  And with each repetition, I silently thank Aimi, and consecrate our lovemaking to her.  I can think of no more fitting memorial.

Holding me locked against him, he turns onto his side.  He pushes his thigh between mine, driving himself into me one last time.  His continued possession shakes me and reassures me all at once.  I do not need his hands on my Collar to know what he’s feeling.  It floods into me through each pore.

His hand fists in my hair, pulling my head back.  A glimpse of burning silver.  Then his mouth descends, a hot brush of skin.  His kisses are as soft and as searing as ever.  He grazes my lips with his teeth, touches his tongue to mine.  But he goes no further, restraining his strength and need.  The intensity of his kisses does not abate, even though he’s sated.  He breathes hot into my mouth.  There’s a sweet urgency to his kisses, but it’s not the drive to consummation.  He’s still buried to the hilt in me.  If he wants another release, all he has to do is move within me.  Instead he kisses me, over and over and over.

Finally, I realize what he needs from me.

I cradle his head in my hands and pull my mouth away from his so I can look into his eyes.  It would be better if he was not inside me when I said this.  If there was nothing sexual about my declaration.  But I cannot bring myself to release him.  He has never let me hold him like this, and I cannot let him go yet.

I hold those quicksilver eyes while I whisper, “I love you, Riddick.”

His eyes shift, his expression edging toward pain.  Need bursts through me.  His need.  It burns, as fiery and unquenchable as the rage it blazes beside in his soul, this need to be loved.  He barely ever acknowledges it; it is a deep and abiding loneliness.  Focused on the business of survival, he has had no time for it.  But now, with his basic needs fulfilled, the desire for affection and companionship has grown so strong he cannot ignore it.  He has tried to slake it with sex.  He has even confused it with sex, believing that if he could possess me, bring me to fulfillment again and again, it would quiet his raging longing.  But our joining doesn’t satisfy his soul the way it does his body.  He needs more, has always needed more.  His desperation – his desolation — brings tears to my eyes.

No one has ever said they love him before.

A montage of images flashes behind my eyes.  Me, walking into a wash of agonizingly bright light, clad only in the veil of my hair.  The Purifier, stripped of his rings and vestments of rank, walking into a firestorm.  A small blonde woman appearing out of the rain, a glowing blue light clenched in her hand.

Each of us saved him, defended him from the light, showed our willingness to give our lives for his.  But no one has ever said they love him.

“Kyra?” I ask in a whisper.

He answers me in images.  A child with shaven hair and make-shift goggles on her forehead.  Imitating him.  Idolizing him.  Needing him.  A woman-child with a riot of brown hair and a tiny curved blade held between her teeth.  Still following him.  Still needing him to save her.  Not a lover or even a friend.  Not someone he could trust with his life.  Or his heart.

And I finally understand how alone he has been.

“I love you,” I say again.  There is nothing more I can say.  He knows I would die for him.  Now he knows I will live for him, too.

He tucks my face into his neck and holds me so close we could be one being.  One skin, one mind, one heart, beating warmly in the darkness.

 

Music, a hushed chorus, muted accompaniment that is neither drums nor strings but some combination of the two, stirs me.  I blink sleepily and look up into the Beast’s quiescent face.  He sleeps deeply, holding me close, his body still buried in mine.  While I look at him, the familiar music echoes through my mind again.

Far away, on Tarenge, the twin moons must be rising.

I have not heard Xia’s music, or prayed to its otherworldly harmonies, since I was Purified.  But now I open my mind to that eerily beautiful music, and pray.

 _Mighty Xia, whose face is the hunter, whose voice is the battle cry, hear me.  Help me be strong.  Help me defend and protect the man I hold.  Help me see his enemies and keep them from him.  Sweet Xia, whose face is the crone, whose voice is the lullaby, hear me.  Help me be strong.  Help me love this warrior I have given my body and heart to.  Help me fill and heal his empty heart.  Xia, hear me, help me be strong_ . . .

The music in my head falls silent, and in that silence, I hear a sibilant voice that is neither man nor woman, one or many.

_Daughter.  Daughter of daughters.  Mother of daughters.  Stand strong beside your warrior.  Be ever his good right hand.  Show him the path to peace._

“Xia,” I breathe aloud although I do not mean to.  _I thought you had abandoned me.  Abandoned us.  When the Necromonger ships came, we fell before them.  We were not strong._

The sibilant voice whispers, _Men rise and fall.  Truth endures.  There is room for the many in the one, and the one in the many.  Remember who you are, daughter._

“I had forgotten,” I choke, shamed and contrite, and bury my face in the Beast’s chest.

_Truth is always with you.  It only waits for you to recall.  The warrior brings you back to the Way.  Follow him._

_Yes, Xia, yes, I will._

The ethereal music begins again.  I lie in the Beast’s arms and listen to it, remembering, until it lulls me back to sleep. 


	20. Chapter 20

I wake to the cool touch of sheets.  Where is he?  Where is my Beast?

I start upright, clutching at the sheets.  Searching the sanctum, I find him at his desk.  He wears the silver and black skullcap.  The lens in front of him runs verdant green.

His eyes flick towards me.  With a grin, he holds a hand out to me.

He says nothing about what has passed between us.  He need say nothing.  For now, it is enough that I’ve told him what he needed to hear.

Sliding out of the bed, I stand and stretch.  My forgotten robe, trailing off my arms, catches in the sheets.  I draw it on and seal it closed against the Basilica’s chill.  Moving makes me aware of how my body aches, arms and back and sides and legs.  And I feel a deeper soreness, from our vigorous lovemaking and from holding him inside me for so long afterwards.  I smile to myself; that is a pain I will gladly bear.

With a final stretch, I pad across the icy stone to him.  I make a mental note to ask the Weavers for some rugs to warm and soften the floor.  It is too cold underfoot.

He swivels the great chair when I reach him.  I sink into his lap, settling into the warmth and comfort of his embrace.  He positions me, as he always does, with my head against his shoulder and his hand in my hair.  Then he turns back to the lens.

In the upper half of the lens, a brilliant green planet revolves against the blackness of space.  In the lower half, neon-bright arcs trace trajectories.  A thick blue line connects an orange point labeled _Helion Prime_ to dim blue point marked _the Portal_.  Close to the Portal, a faint line bends away from the main arc, reaching for a cluster of planets labeled _Galin_.  Nearer Helion, an even fainter line curves towards a small green dot marked _Furya_.

 _Home_.  His thought echoes through my mind, underscored by an intense longing.

“How did you find it?” I ask curiously.  “I thought Furya was destroyed.  All evidence of it wiped away, even off the star charts.”

“A dream,” the Beast grunts.  Reluctance tinges his tone, as though he is loathe to admit he was guided by a dream.  “An’ your Lord Marshal kept good records.”

I twist so I can look up at him.  “ _You_ are my Lord Marshal.”

He grins and his arm tightens around my waist.  “’Bout two months, we’ll come within ten weeks of Furya.  That’s where you get off.”

Not following what he’s saying, I nod absently.

He rests his rough jaw against the side of my face.  “Feel a lot better knowin’ you’re safe.”

“Safe?” I repeat, still not understanding him.

“I’ll send a squad of Elites with you.  An’ anyone else you want to take.  Like that guard outside, what’s his name?”

“Caden,” I murmur, bewildered.

“Yeah.”  He strokes his thumb up the back of my neck.  “I’d send one of the big ships with you, but it’d attract the wrong kind of attention.”

I nod absently.  Staring at the small green dot on the chart, and the revolving, green planet, I finally fit together what he’s saying.

“You’re sending me to Furya?”

“Yeah, best place for you.”

I go rigid.  He’s sending me away?  “My place is at your side.”

Xia said to stand beside him.  To be always his good right hand.  How will I protect him if he sends me away?

“Always gonna be another Edellis or Dame Vaako, Liaden.”  His voice deepens, darkens.  “I’m not taking any more chances.”

So he plans to send me away?

The sight of the silently revolving green planet is suddenly abhorrent.  He plans to send me _there_?

I push back from the desk and climb out of his arms.  “I go with you to the Threshold.”

“No, you don’t.”  He crosses his arms over his chest.  It is a gesture I have come to know well, and dislike intensely when he uses it against me.  It means he has already made his mind up, and he is steeling himself against whatever argument I might raise.

I will not agree to this.  No matter the danger, my place is at his side.

“You cannot send me away.  It’s our law.  The Lord Marshal must be protected.”

“ _I’m_ the law,” he growls and slowly rises from his chair.

I can see his building anger.  Hear it in his voice.  Feel it in a skin-ruffling surge up my spine.  I need to placate him.  Spreading my hands, I ask, “How long?  When will I join you?”

“You don’t.”  He leans against the edge of the desk.  “I’ll meet you on Furya.”

I touch my fingertips to my forehead.  His plans are incomprehensible.  “When?”

“After I get this crew to the Threshold.”  He tilts his head to the side, considering.  “Three years at most.”

Three _years?_

“And then we will cross.”

His mouth firms.  His eyes cool to glacial ice.

With a creeping chill, I remember his words to Edellis.  He has no intention of crossing the Threshold.

I back away from him.  “No.”

“You said you’d go anywhere with me.”  His voice hardens.

To the Threshold.  And beyond.  To the UnderVerse.  To the promised land . . .

I rub my fingers over my face.  He plans to take the Armada to the Threshold, but not cross.  Not to see for himself, the glory of the UnderVerse.  Not to discover for himself, a life without pain.

And he would deny me those things, as well.

What of the reward I’ve worked so hard for?  The sacrifices I’ve made, the life and the world I’ve put behind me for the promise of that blissful future?  Am I to give all that up?  For a future that promises only more of _this_ life, in _this_ ‘Verse, on a planet so forsaken it doesn’t even appear on any star charts?

I start to open my mouth, to deny him, but then stop.  I said I would stay with him, wherever he goes.  I swore it and I am true to my vows.  If he rejects the promise of the UnderVerse and chooses a future on that lost green planet, then so do I.  But we go together.  Always.  I will not let him send me away.

“If you go to Furya, I go with you,” I say firmly.  “But I will not go without you.”

“Yeah, you will,” he growls.

Taking a deep breath, and putting a hand to my Collar in the expectation of swift and terrible punishment, I say, “No.  I’m your concubine.  You can command me to live.  You can command me to die.  But while I’m your right hand, you cannot command me to leave you.”

The punishment I expect so strongly that I’m already gritting my teeth against it doesn’t come.  I wait, fearful and expectant.  The Beast glares at me.  But the Collar lies cool and quiet under my fingers.

Perhaps it agrees with me.

The Beast does not, and I can feel his fury burning through the Collar.  A different kind of fire.

“Remember what happened the last time you wouldn’t fucking listen to me?”

I gape at him.  It is monstrous to remind me of Aimi’s death.

“You’re goin’,” he growls.  “An’ that’s final.”

I shake my head adamantly.  “No Lord Marshal has ever sent his First from his side—”

“Told you, I don’t give a fuck about your traditions.”

“It is against all our laws,” I continue, cutting across him.  “The Lord Marshal must be protected.  You cannot send me away—”

“Liaden,” he rumbles warningly.

I know that tone.  I should heed it.  But I can’t let him command me into this grotesque dereliction of my duty.  It is against every vow I’ve made.  Against the counsel of my God.  Against every instinct I possess.  I _cannot_ let him send me away.

And how would I live without him?  Three _years_ . . .

“Ask anything of me.  _Anything_ ,” I say, my voice rising.  “But not this.  I will not agree to leave you.  If you command me, I will not go.”

“I gave you an order,” he roars.  “And you will fucking obey me!”

“No.”

“Liaden!”

“I will not go!  You would have to dismiss me before I’d ever leave your side!”

We both freeze.  Just as I realize what, in my anger and fear, I’ve said, so does he.  His eyes blaze dangerously.

“I—” I begin.

“You’re dismissed,” he says.

 _No_.

I fall to my knees and wait.  Wait for him to recant his words.  Wait for him to open his arms and envelop me in his comforting embrace.  Surely he does not mean it.  I’ve angered him with my resistance, but he cannot mean . . .

He crosses his arms over his chest and leans back against the desk.

“You don’t mean that,” I whisper, my voice sounding small and strangely flat in the sanctum’s still, heavy air.

“You’re dismissed,” he repeats.  “And you’re going to Furya.”

He turns and moves back around his desk.

I stare at his broad back, wild-eyed.  Something tears in my head, a wet veil rending.  He _dismissed_ me.

I swallow a noise that could be a scream and stagger to my feet.

Around my neck, the Collar goes dead.  The metal feels papery against my skin and bone.  I fear if I touch it, it will crumble like dry leaves, leaving a hole in my flesh as large as the one he has just torn in my soul.

He sits down at his desk, ignoring me.

Swaying, I stumble away into the hollow sanctuary of my chamber.

 

He has dismissed me.  I am no longer the First Concubine.  I am nothing.  I am no one.  A ghost inside the Armada’s machine.  An unbeliever amongst the Faithful.  Liaden.  The Gray One.  A ghost.

I curl into a ball of misery on my bed.  I have no more tears to shed.  I cried them all for Aimi.  Instead, my heart bleeds in dry silence.

He has dismissed me.  I am nothing to him.  I have no place at his side.  No place in his life.  I do not even belong here, lying on this bed, wearing the concubine’s robe.  He must pick a new concubine.

The Lord Marshal must be protected.

I rise slowly and peel off the robe.  Brushing it down, I hang it carefully in the closet.  The rack is full of gowns, some of them made for me, some left to me by Fainche.

None of them mine anymore.

They belong to whomever he picks to replace me.  To whomever he chooses to sit at his right hand while he sends me away.  Light years away.

What have I done to deserve this?  Is loving him such a gross crime that he sends me away?  Furya . . . a dead planet.  Three years . . . an eternity.

And does he truly believe I will be safer there than at his side?  He is my greatest protector, as I am his.  Together we are strong.  Apart, we are vulnerable.  Perhaps he believes he will be unaffected by my absence.  But I know I will be perpetually distracted by my concern for him.  And now that the Collar lies cold and dead around my neck, how will I even know if he’s well?  If he’s returning to me?

How will I bear not knowing?

The creaking of his chair brings me out of myself.  I must go.

I stare into my closet.  There is nothing there for me, as there is nothing in the future I see before me.  I stare at the racks of clothing in a silence so loud it ticks in my ears.  Finally, I remember what lies at the back of the wardrobe.  Digging deep through silk and scalecloth, I find them.  Two sets of black initiate’s robes.  Unused for four years and almost forgotten.

I pull the robes on slowly.  They feel so strange.  The fitted unisuit that goes under the long outer robe is suffocating, constricting.  The scalecloth, serviceable but not of the quality the Weavers use for my gowns, chafes.  The long panels of the over-robes flap around my legs when I turn away from the closet.  I feel half-dressed.  Indecent.  A pang of longing for what I leave behind shoots through me.  But I push it aside.  He has dismissed me, and I must go.  Nothing here belongs to me anymore, and I do not belong among these remnants of my past.

I look quickly around the small chamber.  No longer _my_ chamber.  Four years of thinking of it as home, as the last home I would have, before greeting the glory of the UnderVerse.

Now I will never see the UnderVerse.  And this small, comfortable room is no longer my home.  I must try to make a new home on some strange, green world that no living man has ever seen.

Except the Beast.

I glance up, through the archway, to see what he is doing.  He sits at his desk, staring at the lens.  The colors of the lens are stationary.  His hands lie loosely on his thighs, not touching the lens’s reactive surface.  Perhaps he’s thinking.  I can no longer tell.  The Collar lies dead around my neck, a cold weight against my spine, and I don’t know what he is thinking or feeling.  The absence of his thoughts leaves a larger void in my breast than even the loss of my station.

I tuck the spare set of initiate’s robes under my arm and begin moving towards the door.  My eyes light on my dressing table.  Not mine.  Not anymore.  The weapons and jewels and ornaments piled in boxes and on stands, none of them belong to me anymore.  I have no right to wear them.

Hannelore’s tooled sheath catches my eye.  The Beast gave Hannelore to me.  Perhaps he would not object if I took her with me.  No matter what he thinks, no matter how many friends he thinks I have, I am not safe away from his side, and Hannelore would be welcome protection, here and in the future.

I pick up her sheath and wrap the gold chain around my hand.  Carrying the spare robes and my dagger, I walk slowly back into the sanctum.

The Beast’s eyes lift from the lens when I stop in front of him and drop into an obeisance.  His silver glare flicks over me, taking in the black robes and the weapon.  What he sees displeases him; I can tell from the way his mouth tightens.

“I’d like to take Hannelore with me,” I say quietly.

“Only place you’re goin’ is that bed.  Put it under your pillow.”

His words maul at my heart, but I shake my head.  “I cannot share your bed.  I’m neither your concubine nor your companion.”  And I am not a whore.  “You must select a replacement today.  You cannot go unprotected.”

Perhaps she will serve him better than I have, without my failings.  Perhaps she will protect him better.  Perhaps she will love him as much as I do.

She could not love him more.

His eyes flare dangerously.  “Liaden—”

“If the Lord Marshal requires, I will summon the available women of the Armada to the Great Hall so you may choose among them.”

“What I _require_ is for you—”

A chime sounds.  It is a soft sound, unobtrusive, but we both freeze.

“What’s that?” he snaps.

“Someone kneels on the steps of the Throne,” I tell him.  “They request an audience with the Lord Marshal.”

“They’ll wait.”

I shake my head.  “No one would kneel there if it wasn’t urgent.”

The Beast’s mouth tightens in annoyance, but he rises from his chair, drags the skullcap off his head, and stalks towards his wardrobe.

“Change,” he growls at me.

“Lord?”

“Change!  Until we get this straight, you’re still my concubine.  You show up dressed like that an’ everyone’ll know.  Change.  Now.”

I nod and turn towards my chamber.  His words make sense.  It would be dangerous to expose the rift between us to the court.  To protect him, I’m willing to engage in a small deception.

Stripping off the initiate’s robes is a relief.  I leave them folded on the corner of the bed and briefly consider wearing the white gown he chose for me this morning.  But I reject it in favor of a gray lorganza.  Whatever waits for us in the Great Hall, I will feel better meeting it swathed in the lorganza’s protection.

I rejoin him in the sanctum, settling my weapons in place.  He wears his Dyneemal tunic and arm bracers; the weapons belt rides his hips.

Perhaps he has the same thought.

His silver gaze sweeps over me, lingering for a moment on the golden girdle of Hannelore’s chain around my waist.  He nods in approval.  Then he offers me his arm.  I have no right to take it.  But I do, feeling a thin trickle of the pride that flushed me when he last honored me this way.  Walking by his side, my hand resting on his elbow, sends a shaft of mingled pleasure and pain through me.  I want to be this close to him always.  To feel the warmth and security of him by my side, the strength of him under my fingers.  But he has found a way to send me away.

 _Three years_ . . . how will I bear it?

 

The Great Hall seethes with bodies and whispers.  Courtiers and soldiers step aside, creating a long corridor to the Throne, when the Beast and I enter through the great doors.  On the bottom step of the Throne, a man in armor kneels.  I do not need to see his face to know who it is.  His highly decorated armor, and the jet black skin of his bowed neck, tell me.

Toal.

I hear the Beast exhale.  When I glance up at him, his mouth is set in a white line.  But he betrays nothing else, and without the Collar’s link, I cannot tell what he’s thinking.  As hard as I resisted the Collar when Zhylaw first put it on me, in this moment, I would fight twice as hard to have the Beast place it on me again.

He leads me forward steadily.  At the steps, we part around Toal.  When we reach the top of the stairs, the Beast takes my hand again and helps me up into my seat on the right flange of the Throne.

As I settle onto my knees, I realize he has seated me before seating himself.  Never, never has a concubine been shown such honor by her Lord Marshal.  I have to bite my lips to keep from sighing.

And I am not even his concubine anymore.  Why show me such honor now?

The Beast sinks heavily onto the Throne.  He stares down at Toal for several long seconds, letting the silence in the Great Hall stretch, before he finally growls, “Commander Toal?”

Toal rises but does not mount the stairs.  He puts his hands on the weapons belt buckled over his armor.  His dark fingers curl around the white, worked hilts of Zoelle and Zurina, the daggers the Beast gave him.

To assure his loyalty.

And I realize what Toal is about to do.

The Beast has Manoj and Marened, but they are no match for the Banshees.  He must not fight Toal when Toal wields a soul-stealer.  If the Beast is wounded by one of the Banshees . . .

“He’s going to issue challenge,” I whisper, frantic.

The Beast reaches over and places his hand on the back of my neck.  The gesture is familiar, comforting, but with the Collar dead, I don’t know what he’s thinking.  Whether he understands the danger.  Did I tell him what the Banshees do?  I scrabble to remember.  It was only two nights ago that we stood in the armory and I pointed them out to him.  But I can’t remember.

I begin working my blowpipe out of my glove and into my palm, to be ready if Toal charges the Throne.

Then Toal speaks, and whatever brief advantage we may have gained is lost.

“I ask the Lord Marshal to release the captive Vaako.  So I may challenge him,” Toal says.

I feel weak with relief.

The Beast shifts on the Throne.  Then he beckons Toal up the steps with two fingers.

When Toal reaches the top step, he kneels.  The Beast leans forward on the Throne, until his cheek almost brushes Toal’s.  Burnished gold against midnight.

“Killing Vaako won’t bring her back,” the Beast whispers.

“But it will avenge her,” Toal replies in the same murmur.

The Beast sits back.  His head drops almost to his chest, and I can see the familiar pendulum motion of his eyes.  His thumb moves, slowly, hypnotically, against my neck, caressing me like a talisman while he thinks.

It takes him only a moment to come to a decision.  He lifts his head and nods to one of the honor guard standing on the stairs.

“Bring Vaako.”

“Yes, Lord Marshal!”  The Elite snaps a salute and moves off down the stairs in a clatter of armor.

The Beast broods, his hand still stroking my neck, while we wait.  I watch Toal, who continues to kneel on the step below the Throne.  His hands work on the Banshees’ grips.  A faint tremor runs up his thigh.  He must be stiff from kneeling for so long.

“Toal,” I murmur to the Beast.

The Beast’s eyes flick to me, and then to Toal.  He says nothing for a moment, and I wonder if he sees what I see.  Need I say more, and risk humiliating Toal if the courtiers overhear?  The Beast’s silver eyes miss nothing.  Surely he sees . . .

Perhaps he sees and says nothing because he wants Toal to be handicapped going into the fight with Vaako.  I know he doesn’t truly suspect Vaako of treachery.  But one of them must die once Toal issues challenge.  Would the Beast prefer it to be Toal?

“Stand up, Toal,” the Beast rumbles.  He gestures to the left side of the Throne.  Toal rises, and with an expression of awe, moves to stand by the left armrest of the Throne.  I know for a fact Toal has never been invited above the top stair before.  It must be a heady honor for him, even in the depths of his grief.

Knowing that his grief is my doing, which I could have prevented if I’d only left myself less vulnerable, makes my heart ache.

How can the Beast command me to leave him, to expose him to the same vulnerability?  I must make him choose a new concubine.  He cannot be unprotected.

“Liaden,” Toal says.  Hearing my name sends a shock through me.  I’m used to being invisible when I sit at my Lord Marshal’s right hand.

“Yes, Commander?”

“Would you—”  His jaw works and his hands tighten on the hilts of the daggers.  “Would you take care of Aimi?  Whatever happens here?”

I bow my head to him.  “Of course.  It would be my honor.”

It will be an honor to wash and dress Aimi’s body.  It will also tear me apart to see her dead, and to ready her for her wait to cross the Threshold, knowing that I will never join her on the other side.  I swallow hard and smile at Toal as warmly as I can, through the tears gathering in the corners of my eyes.

Toal nods at me, and then his eyes, all eyes, turn to the Great Doors, through which a group of Elites march Vaako.

Vaako looks so pale it’s surprising he’s walking.  His usual stride is shortened by the chains circling his ankles.  He shuffles down the corridor left by the courtiers and soldiers filling the Hall.  He looks at no one except the Beast.  His eyes are fixed on the Throne, and his face is pleading.

When he reaches the bottom step, Vaako throws himself down.  He lifts his manacled wrists to the Beast.

“My Lord Marshal,” he says.  “However I have offended you, forgive me.  You gave me a second chance, and I’ve done nothing to break your trust.”

The Beast leans forward and stares hard at the pale, sweating ex-commander.  “Your wife did,” he says.

Vaako’s eyes widen.  “Forgive her, Lord Marshal.  She’s impetuous and I haven’t controlled her as strongly as I—”

The Beast cuts him off with a shake of his head.  “She’s dead, Vaako.”

The little remaining color drains out of Vaako’s face.  He sways, and his hands drop in a rattle of chains, but somehow he remains upright.  A testament to his training.

The Beast slumps back into the Throne.  I don’t need the link to know what he’s thinking.  If he had any doubt about Vaako’s loyalty, Vaako’s shock at his companion’s death has dispelled it.  Vaako is loyal.  Toal is loyal.  And one of them will die shortly by the other’s hand.

“Toal.”  The Beast’s tone is utterly flat.  Unrevealing.

Toal is no fool.  He glances warily at the Beast.  But the Beast angles his face away, leaving his commander to make his own decision.

My heart swells.  He could command Toal.  Force his commander to give up this path of vengeance.  Instead he leaves Toal to make up his own mind.  He gives Toal freedom of choice.  Something none of us have had since the purification prongs were driven into our necks.

I didn’t think I could love him any more than I did when he lay inside me and let me feel his need.  But I do in this moment.  Watching him let Toal make his own choice, I love him so much my chest aches with it.

Toal’s dark face works as he struggles.  And a vague hope surges against my sense of foreboding.  Maybe Toal will let it go.  Maybe he will choose freedom, and forgiveness.

But rage and grief win out.  I can see it in the way the bones of his cheek and jaw suddenly surge under his skin.  He will have his revenge.  He is a Necromonger, and it is the Necromonger way.

“Your companion killed my chosen,” Toal says, his upper lip curling.  “And tried to kill the Lord Marshal’s concubine.”

Vaako’s eyes leave the Beast’s face for the first time, flying to me.

I could show him anger, let blame fill my face.  He should have controlled his companion better, and even he knows it.

But there’s no rage left in me.  Vaako, Toal, all of us have been given a second chance by Zhylaw’s downfall.  We must not waste it on blame and retribution.  Vaako turned traitor against a man who deserved no loyalty.  And if he sinned, it was only in loving his companion so much it clouded his judgment.  A blameless sin.  And one with which I am becoming intimately familiar.

So instead of blame, I pour sympathy into my eyes.  Vaako stares at me for a moment, his brow furrowing.  Then he looks away, and bows his head so that none of us can see his expression.

A cold shaft cuts through my breast.  Doesn’t he understand?  Doesn’t he see the chance he’s been given?  Is he resigned to death?  No man should die for loving his companion too much.  Unconsciously, I reach for the Beast, my hand moving along the arm of the Throne until I find his side and press my fingers against the warm solidity of his ribs.

The Beast shifts towards me, until my whole arm is pressed against his side; his hand tightens reassuringly on the nape of my neck.

His support gives me the courage to say, “Dame Vaako is dead.  I am satisfied.  Let us all start anew.”

Vaako lifts his head and looks at me.  The pain in his eyes could destroy worlds.  His mouth tightens and I expect him to speak.  But he says nothing, and after staring at me for a moment, he drops his head again.

Failure washes through me in a bitter tide.  There is no hope in his eyes.  He will let Toal kill him.

“I’m not,” Toal says heavily.  “Your life for the life of my companion.  I give challenge.”

Bowing to the Beast, Toal stalks down the steps towards Vaako.

“Riddick,” I whisper urgently.  Will he let Vaako die this way?

“Let it play out,” he murmurs in response.

My Lord Marshal has spoken, and there is nothing I can do but watch this sham unfold.  There is honor in dying in battle, but there is no honor in letting your enemy kill you for your imagined sins.

I’ve watched duels before.  Zhylaw encouraged them between campaigns.  A little bloodshed, he said, to keep the officers occupied.  It seemed a waste of talent then, before the Beast made me understand the value of a single man’s life.  It is an abomination now.

At a nod from the Beast, an Elite unchains Vaako.  Then the Elites step back.  The courtiers and soldiers on the floor move in concert, opening a circle on the floor.  Toal brushes past Vaako and walks to the middle of the circle.  With a flourish, he unsheathes the Banshees.

Their howling fills the Great Hall.  It is soft now, the distant cry of the winter wind.  But it will grow, and grow, and grow until the Banshees’ bloodlust is sated, or everyone in the Hall has gone mad from their screams.

Vaako rises.  Although the fight has not yet begun, he moves stiffly, as though already wounded.  He holds his hand out to an Elite gripping a battle-axe.  When the Elite yields the weapon, Vaako hefts it with both hands, testing the weight and balance.  Then he paces into the circle to face Toal.

Toal immediately lunges, sweeping one of the Banshees in a shearing arc towards Vaako’s heart.  The move is a feint.  Toal shifts his weight onto his back foot, checking his forward momentum long before the dagger reaches Vaako.  It is a move designed to draw Vaako out, to make Vaako swing the axe so that Toal can gauge his reach and strength.

But whether through wile or apathy, Vaako refuses to be baited.  He steps backwards, out of the arc of Toal’s swing, and brings the axe up like a shield, ready for the real strike, a downward sweep of Toal’s left hand.  Metal shrieks on metal, drowning the Banshees’ howling for a moment.

With a sharp shove, Vaako pushes Toal back.  Vaako spins, and I see his face.  It has gone feral.  His lips are pulled back from his teeth.  His eyes have ignited.  All apathy and resignation are gone.  Rage has kindled inside him.  Cold, killing rage.  He will not die without a fight, and he is rumored to be the best warrior among the Lord Marshal’s commanders.  He will kill Toal, or die trying.

The battle-axe shears through the air in a vicious circle.  Toal leaps back, but the axe’s honed edge catches the edge of his breastplate.  The axe finishes its ambit in a red spray.

Despite his wound, Toal retaliates immediately.  As Vaako twists, recovering from his swing, Toal slashes downward, into the vulnerable joint between Vaako’s shoulder plate and the couter that protects his upper arm.

Now it is Vaako who bleeds.

Vaako pulls back, and Zoelle’s white hilt protrudes from his biceps.  With a titanic clatter, he drops the axe and wrenches the Banshee out of his arm just as her howling rises to an unholy shriek and the black mist of his soul begins to gather above the surface of his armor.

The Beast’s fingers curl over my shoulder, and make me realize I’ve half-risen onto my knees.  “Easy, Liaden,” he whispers.

I sink back onto my heels.

“Thought you wanted Vaako dead,” he murmurs.

I shake my head slightly.  “I was wrong.”

The Beast slants his silver eyes at me, and a small smile curves his mouth.  Then he focuses his attention back on the floor.  The two men circle each other, each gripping one of the Banshees, and their screams fill the Hall.

Snarling, Vaako rushes Toal.  Toal is taller, with a longer reach.  Vaako seeks to overcome that advantage with speed.  For a moment, I think he’s succeeded.  He slides effortlessly under Toal’s strike and whirls away.  Another bright splash of blood stains the air, this time from Toal’s side.  Clutched in Vaako’s hand, Zoelle wails with her second taste of blood.  But the strike is not deep enough for the Banshee to take Toal’s soul.

Not so with Zurina, whose white hilt protrudes from Vaako’s back.

I stare, dumbfounded.  I missed it, but Toal must have struck as Vaako spun past him.  Toal’s longer reach has served him well.  The Banshee is driven deep between Vaako’s shoulder blades.  Into a join in his armor that Toal must know is a vulnerable spot, from wearing identical armor for so many years.

Vaako falls to his knees, reaching vainly for the dagger embedded in his back.  His armor limits his motion.  He claws at his back, but cannot reach the dagger.  The black mist begins to rise.  The Banshees’ screech becomes ear-splitting.

“Riddick—” I plead.

His hand tightens on my shoulder for an instant.  Then he is in motion, leaping out of his chair and hurtling down the stairs with such explosive momentum that I can’t follow him.  He is on the floor before I can blink.  Before I even slide off my perch to follow him, he’s sprinting across the floor towards Vaako.

Toal’s there first, stepping into the path of the charging Beast.  For a gut-clenching moment, I think Toal will try to intervene.  If the Beast wastes even a few seconds dealing with Toal, Vaako will be lost.

I pull my blowpipe free and set it to my mouth, sighting down its length at Toal’s left eye.

But before I release the dart, Toal wrenches the dagger out of Vaako’s back.  Vaako reels and collapses onto the blood-spattered marquetry.

Toal turns and faces the Beast, who has checked his head-long rush only a step away from the two combatants.  One of the Water-Stealers glints blue in the Beast’s grip.  He holds it loosely by his side, even when Toal raises the bloody dagger.

Opening his hand, Toal drops the dagger to the floor.  The Banshees’ shrieks suddenly cease.

“I’m satisfied,” Toal says into the silence.

The Beast stares at Toal, and from the tightness of his shoulders, I can tell he’s still unsure.  Then he nods at Toal.

“Get a healer,” the Beast barks at an Elite.  He kneels next to Vaako, yanking at the side-clasps on Vaako’s breastplate to open the metal clamshell and inspect the damage within.

I tuck away my blowpipe hastily and rush down the stairs to join the Beast.  Toal kneels at Vaako’s other side.  Together, they open the armor.  Blood courses down the scalecloth still covering Vaako’s back.  It falls to the floor with a patter like rain, and even without examining the wound, I can tell from the amount of blood that the wound is deep.  A killing blow.  Vaako will need a master healer, and I can no longer call Tomoetu with my Collar.

I turn to call a Servant for bandages to bind Vaako’s wounds.  Perhaps I can buy him a few precious minutes.

And find Nazya already beside me, holding an armful of white cloth.

Later, I will ask her how she came to be in the Great Hall, carrying such an odd burden.  For now, I drop to my knees next to Vaako and begin binding his wounds as quickly as I can.

The Beast, unexpectedly, helps me, gathering a wad of the cloth and pressing it hard against the back-wound while I wind the bandage around Vaako’s chest.  As I work, I steal a glance at the face of my patient.  It is pale, set, sweating.  He doesn’t look at me or the Beast or Toal or any of the courtiers that mill around us.  Instead, he focuses on the middle distance, where the statue of Zhylaw rises in armored segments.

Hatred burns through the pain dulling his eyes.

And I realize that I’m not the only one who loved Zhylaw once, and learned to hate him.  Vaako was there long before me.

“He’s gone, Vaako,” I say softly.  “You have a chance to start over.”

Vaako’s eyes snap to me.  “Is that what you’re doing?”

I glance at the Beast, who meets my eyes over Vaako’s shoulder.   “We all deserve a second chance.”

Vaako shakes his head, and his eyes glaze.

I slide my blood-stained glove under his chin.  “We all deserve a second chance,” I repeat.  “Stay with us, Vaako.”

“She’s gone,” he whispers.

“I know.”  I can’t bring myself to say I’m sorry, because I’m not.  I would kill her again if I had to.  In a heart-beat.  But I do regret the pain I’ve caused Vaako, and Toal.  “All of us lost someone we loved today.  Let’s mourn them together, instead of seeking to join them.”

I look at the Beast again, and think of the comfort he gave me when I mourned Aimi.

The Beast gives me a small smile.  He watches while I tie the bandages tightly around Vaako’s chest.  Then he grabs Vaako’s neck and pulls the surprised commander around to face him.  With a snap of his other arm, the Beast catches the collar of Toal’s armor and drags Toal down until all three men are nose-to-nose.

“No more fightin’,” he growls.  “This is the end of it, or I’ll kill you both before your Due-fucking-Time.”

Vaako and Toal glance at each other and nod in unison.

“You need someone lookin’ after you.  Both of you,” the Beast say.  His eyes flick to me, then back to the two commanders.  “You’re each gonna pick a concubine.  Today.  Soon as you’re healed.”

He releases each man, and Vaako sags back against me.  Together, Vaako and I stare incredulously at the Beast.  But none of us say a word, and we sit in silence until the healers, Master Tomoetu and Master Hiuyen and four red-robed apprentices, rush to us.

The Beast rises.  With a hand in the healer’s chest, he stops Tomoetu from tending Vaako.  “Not you,” he says.  “I need you for somethin’ else.”

Tomoetu raises a white eyebrow, but does not argue.  He waves two apprentices forward and stands back with the Beast.  The apprentices ease Vaako out of my arms and begin to heal him.

I stand, brushing off my skirts.  When I see the bloodstains there, I abandon the effort.

“Liaden,” the Beast says quietly.  “Come upstairs when you’re done.”

His emphasis on the final word reminds me of what I need to do.  He has to choose a new concubine, and now he has ordered Vaako and Toal to make their choices as well.

“Yes, my Lord.”

I watch him go, the old healer trailing after him, and a heaviness descends on my heart.  I don’t want to be parted from him even for a moment.  But I have no place at his side now, and soon he will walk away from me not just for minutes but for years.  Perhaps forever.  I rub at my aching chest, but it is as fruitless an effort as cleaning my gown.

Slowly, I turn towards the Lord’s Walk, which will take me down to the Basilica’s communication center, and the central lens from which I can send a message to  the women of the Armada. 


	21. Chapter 21

When I return to the sanctum, the Inner Doors stand open.  The outer chamber is empty.  Where is the Guardian?  Is the Lord Marshal wholly unguarded?

I rush towards the doors, but pull up short when I hear voices from within.

“—I agree with you, son.  The collars are an abomination,” Tomoetu says.  “But I don’t know of any way to take them off.  You’re more likely to kill her trying.  I’m sorry, but if there really was a way to get it off, I’m afraid it died with the purifier.”

I steal closer, to hear more.

“And the other thing?”  The Beast’s voice, low, with the slightest edge of annoyance.

“Of course I’ll go.  We won’t be the only volunteers, either.  You’ll see.  You’ll be hard pressed to fit everyone who will want to go on just one frigate.”

The Beast chuckles.  “Okay.”

The voices fall silent for a moment.  Then the Beast says, his voice distinct and carrying, “You can come in, Liaden.”

My face flames.  I should have known better than to try to eavesdrop.  His senses are too keen.  I grind my teeth together and step through the open doors.

“My Lord Marshal,” I say as coolly as I can manage.

The Beast stands facing me, leaning against the edge of his desk.  The other two men turn to look at me.  Tomoetu sits in the Lord Marshal’s chair, which has been pulled around to the front of the desk.  Caden stands at attention on the Beast’s other side, gripping his war-axe.

Caden’s face looks as fiery as mine feels.  I lift an eyebrow at him.  “Shouldn’t you be guarding the door?” I ask.

Caden turns purple, but he glances at the Beast before he moves.

The Beast nods and Caden strides past me, closing the doors with a solid thunk.

“Up on the bed, Liaden,” the Beast says curtly.

He’s annoyed with me.  Why?  I’ve done what he wanted.  Carried the pretense so that no one suspected that he was without his concubine’s protection.  Called the women of the Armada together so that he might choose another concubine from among them.  What more does he want of me?

I shake my head.

The Beast crosses his arms over his chest.  His eyes narrow to moon-cold crescents.  “I want the healer to have a look at you.”

“Why?”  I glance at Master Tomoetu.  “Your acolyte did a fine job healing me.  If there is anything he would like as a healing-gift . . .”  I trail off, realizing that I have no right to the valuables in the Lord Marshal’s private stocks anymore.

Tomoetu watches me silently for a moment.  Then he rises, gathering his robes around him with an old man’s dignity.  “I’d still like to take a look at you, Liaden.  Would you rather sit?”

I survey the healer and the Beast.  There is some conspiracy here.  It rides the air like a bad smell.  But I cannot put my finger on what it might be, and there is little point in arguing with either of them until I know what they’ve been plotting.

I move towards the bed, which the Servants of the Chamber have made in my absence.  Stretching across the bed’s fur cover reminds me of our last bout of lovemaking, a memory that sends both joy and dismay shafting through me.  I am not sorry I told the Beast I love him.  He should know he’s not so alone.  But if I’d known it would spur him into sending me away, I would have waited.  A few more days by his side, in his arms.  And if I’d known it would be the last time we would make love, I would have made it last longer.

The two men move around me: Tomoetu to my side and the Beast to the foot of the bed.  The Beast leans against one of the thick bedposts, his eyes gleaming in the shadows cast by the bed’s drapery.  He watches closely while Tomoetu spreads gnarled hands in the air above my stomach.  The healer lowers his hands, until I feel the lightest pressure through the cloth of my gown.

Tomoetu’s eyes close; his eyelids are so parchment-thin that I can see the shadow of his irises moving behind them.  The shadows flick back and forth under his lids, movement that reminds me of the Beast’s expression when he is lost in thought.

How I will miss that expression – all of the Beast’s small mannerisms – while we are apart.  Three years . . .

“You were lucky, Liaden,” Tomoetu murmurs, pressing a finger over one healed stab-wound.  “This one just missed.”

Missed what?

Tomoetu opens his eyes and smiles down at me.  “You’re fine, my dear.  Very lucky.  No harm done.”

I return his smile.  “As I said.”

“You probably won’t notice any difference for a few weeks.  Then you may notice some tenderness in your breasts.  Maybe a little morning sickness.  Come see me if you do.  I can help relieve the nausea.”

I sit up abruptly.  “Morning sickness?”

Tomoetu glances at the Beast.  “She didn’t know?”

I turn my head to stare at the Beast.  He asked Tomoetu to examine me.  He must have suspected, must have guessed somehow . . .

The Beast’s expression is inscrutable.  He simply watches me, his arms crossed over his chest.

Realization breaks over me in a wave.  A feverish sweat slicks my face and chest.  Cold follows; icy fingers that walk down my spine. 

I’m . . . _breeding_. 

My lingering Necromonger sensibilities revolt at the idea.  Beneath them, the Daixian hunter in my soul throws her head back and howls in triumph.

My head reels.

I clap my hand over my mouth as my stomach clenches violently.  My throat works, and I can’t keep my gorge down.  I retch dryly into my hand, bringing up a thin stream of bile.

Tomoetu’s cool hands press against the back of my neck, under the oppressively hot weight of my hair, where the Beast usually touches me.  I shudder at his chill, unfamiliar touch, and slide across the bed, away from both men, wiping my mouth.

“How long?” I ask Tomoetu.

The healer looks nervously to the Beast, and then back at me.  “How long have you been breeding?  A day, two at most.”

Rage erupts from my belly, riding the sour taste of bile.  This is why he suddenly felt the need to protect me.  Not because he loves me or fears for me.  But because somehow he knew I carried his child.

“You _knew_ ,” I hiss at the Beast.  “You knew and you planned to send me away.”

His eyes narrow to leaden slits.  “You’re safer on Furya.  Both of you.”

“You _impregnate_ me,” I spit the word.  “And then you send me off to have your child alone on a dead, lost world?”

His jaw works with the effort of not shouting back at me and his lips tighten to a white line, but he says nothing.

I hate him in that moment.  With a fine burning hatred that I have never felt for anyone or anything before.

“I will go,” I say, forcing each word out between my teeth.  “And I will bear your child by myself.  And every night I will sing to it of how its father loved us so little that he sent us away across the stars—”

The Beast lunges across the bed at me, but I leap back, out of his grasp.

“Don’t touch me!  I am nothing to you!  You dismissed me and I am nothing—”

“Liaden!” he roars at me.

“No!  This is what you will have of me.  This is what you wanted and this is what you will have!”

The Beast grips the bedpost so hard the wood groans.  If the Collar still lived, his rage would burn me to ash.  But he has broken the link, the Collar is dead, and I feel only my own fury.

It sustains me through long moments while his eyes bore white-hot into my own.  The force of his will is palpable, beating against my resolve.  But I have bent, I have knelt, once.  And I will not kneel again.  He can dismiss me; he can send me away; but he cannot break me.

He pushes back from the bed suddenly.  “You win, Liaden.”

Turning on his heel, he stalks out of the sanctum.

I gape after him, so shocked by his withdrawal I’m left reeling.  What have I won?  Nothing.  An exile on a dead world with a baby I never expected, never wanted, to raise on my own.

I sink down onto the edge of the bed and cover my face with my hands.

“Liaden,” Tomoetu whispers, his voice shaken but still soothing.  “Liaden, you mustn’t hate him for trying to protect you.”

I don’t.  I love him.  That’s what makes him sending me away so unbearable.  The thought of being separated from him tears holes in my soul.  That, and the knowledge that he feels none of the same pain.  Because he does not love me.  Because he cares so little about me and the child I carry that he can send us from his side knowing, _knowing_.  I press my hand to my mouth as my gorge rises again.

The bed creaks as Tomoetu sits down next to me.  He rests his palm on my hair and sighs.  “I hate to see you in such pain.”

I shake my head under his hand.  This is not a pain he can heal.

“When you’re young, a year seems like a lifetime.  But it’s really the blink of an eye, Liaden.  Take it from an old man.”

I wipe my mouth with my fingertips and look up at the healer.  “Three years is an eternity.  Especially with a baby to raise.”  I rub my forehead, which has begun to throb.  “How will I do it?  I barely remember my sisters as infants.  I haven’t even _seen_ a child in years—”

“None of us have.  We’ll manage, Liaden.”

His encouragement makes me smile sadly.  Why isn’t it the Beast saying these things to me?  Why isn’t he sitting beside me, comforting me?

“Master Tomoetu . . . it’s kind of you to offer to come with me.  But you, of all people, have earned your place in the UnderVerse.”

Tomoetu pats my hand and looks away, at the Conquest Icon glowering down on us from the nearby wall.

“Have I?” he asks softly, musing aloud.  “I’ve begun to wonder, Liaden.  When I first converted, I was filled with the fire of the Faith.  The UnderVerse called to me from the end of the great and glorious trail that was the Campaign.”  He looks back at me and smiles gently.  “I’ve watched nineteen systems fall, Liaden.  Over thirty worlds.  So many I’ve forgotten some of the names.  People, too.  They’ve come and gone.  Do you know you’re the eleventh First Concubine I’ve served?”

I blink at him in surprise.  I had no idea.

“You must remember Danior,” I say.

“I do.”  He nods sadly.  “And Baylock.  You remind me a bit of Danior.  You have the same light she had.  The same good heart under your reserve.  For a while I thought you might meet the same fate she did.  I’m glad you’ve chosen another path, Liaden.”

Despite everything that has happened, so am I.  The thought of taking the Knife now, of following Zhylaw into his passionless afterlife, makes my soul shrivel.

Tomoetu pats my hand again.  “This ‘Verse is too dark a place to deprive it of your light, Liaden.  Furya is the place for you. Particularly now that you’re breeding.”

My chest tightens.  No matter what Tomoetu says, no matter what the Beast believes, I cannot believe that sending me away is the right thing.  “Furya may be the place for me,” I say slowly.  “And I would go there gladly at his command.  But not without him.  It’s my duty to protect him, Master Tomoetu.  How can it be right that I’m not by his side?”

“Girl, there are more important things than duty.”

I rise, frowning.  “How can _you_ say that, Master?  You who have risked your own life so many times, venturing to the edge of the Threshold, in the name of your duty?”

Tomoetu chuckles, a dry sound, like wind through leaves.  “That makes me the perfect person _to_ say it.  I know how hollow duty wears with the years.  How cold a comfort it becomes.  How terrible a thing is it to reach the end of your life and look back and be able to say only, ‘I did my duty?’”

I bow my head.  Once, such a reflection would have satisfied me.  To have done my duty, and done it well – was all I had.  All Zhylaw gave me.  Now the Beast has given me more, has helped me discover more in myself.  And a life of nothing but duty seems a terrible thing indeed.

With a creak and a sigh, Tomoetu stands and paces a few steps around the bed.  “I don’t want that to be the sum of my life, either.  That’s why I’ve agreed to come with you.  And . . . because I want to feel the sun on my face again.  I miss the sun.  I find myself dreaming of it a great deal now.  Particularly since our new Lord Marshal took the throne.  That must sound foolish to you.”

Sunlight and dappled shade, and a starlit sky at night, to sing under.  I’m abruptly filled with the same longing.

“No, Master.  It’s not foolish.”

“You’re kind,” he says.  “Humoring an old man.  I hope you’ll continue to do it on Furya.  And let me play with the baby once in a while.”  His eyes darken suddenly and he turns away from me.  “I haven’t played with a baby in a very long time.”

“Master?” I ask cautiously, not wishing to pry into his pain, but to give him an opening if he wishes to share it with me.

Tomoetu stands with his back to me, and speaks so quietly, he could be speaking to himself.  “I’ve killed hundreds of babies.  New converts who came to us pregnant.  Converts who hadn’t had the procedure yet and were careless.  Babies a few days old.  Babies who were only counting down the hours until they were born.  Babies exactly like the baby growing inside you now, Liaden.  No more guilty of sin.  No less deserving of life.”  His head tilts back as he stares up at the Conquest Icon.  “I’ve killed indiscriminately.  In the name of the Faith.  In the name of the Lord Marshal.  I’m a healer, but I’ve taken more lives than some of the most hardened killers in the Legion Vast.  Does that earn me a place in the UnderVerse?  Or just in hell?”

His doubt wrenches at me.  It echoes my own.

I give him the only answer I have.  An answer dredged from the depths of my own guilt.  “You were doing your duty.  We all were.”

Even as I say it, there is no comfort in the words.

Tomoetu stands silent for a moment.  Then he whispers, “When this new Lord Marshal took the throne, I knew there would be change.  Twenty years under the same man.  The same rule.  There was bound to be change.”  He turns back to me suddenly.  His eyes are red and wet.  “What I didn’t know.  What I didn’t expect, was how much change there would be in here.”  He presses his knuckles to his chest.

Nodding wordlessly, understanding completely, I take a step towards him and hold out my hand.

The Beast would take my hand, come to me.  But Tomoetu turns away.  He rubs shaking fingers over his eyes.  “Not everyone will feel the same way, Liaden.  Not everyone will feel this change.  That’s why you have to go.  And soon.  Before _your_ change becomes obvious.  It’s too dangerous for you to remain with the Armada.  I’m surprised you can’t see that for yourself.”

I touch my hand to my belly, thinking of the tiny life curled within.  In a few months, that life will swell my belly and my sacrilege will be apparent to all.  Tomoetu’s right.  I cannot remain with the Armada.

But what of the Beast?  He won’t be with me to watch my belly swell.  To feel the baby kick beneath my skin.  He’ll miss the baby’s birth, its first steps, its first words.  By the time he joins us – if he ever does – the baby will be a child, walking, talking.  Doesn’t he care about everything he’ll miss?

“You’ll have to be circumspect, girl,” Tomoetu continues.  “It’ll be hard to keep your secret for long.  I’d say the fewer people who know, the better.  Maybe just you, me and the Lord Marshal.  But then—”  He eyes me.  “You’re good at keeping secrets.”

I frown at him, feeling his censure but not understanding the why of it.  “What do you mean, Master?”

His mouth folds down at the corners.  “It’s over.  You don’t have to hide what Zhylaw did to you anymore.  I know about it anyway.  Every single one of the others came to me for healing after he’d been at them.  Fainche.  Gennica.  Even your friend, Aimi.  But not you.  Did you think I wouldn’t keep your secret?”

I shake my head vehemently.  “Zhylaw never touched me.”

“Who do you think cleaned up the mess he made of that poor girl he tore apart inside?” Tomoetu asks, grimacing.  “What was her name?  Deazia, I think.  I’ve forgotten, there have been so many.  So why you would bother to lie to me—”

Is that what he’s thought?  All these years?  That I didn’t trust him?

I hold my hand out to him, insistently this time.  “Master, I confided in you when the Collar nearly drove me mad.  I came to you for healing then and I would have come to you if he’d hurt me in any way.  I swear, Zhylaw never touched me.”

Tomoetu sputters and looks shamefaced.  Slowly, he takes my hand between his.  “I’m sorry, girl.  I thought you stayed away because you thought me untrustworthy.”

Hearing the pain I’ve unwittingly caused him makes my chest ache.  I blink back the burning in my eyes.

“I’m the one who should be sorry.  I was so blind.  It was all going on right under my nose.  Right in the next room.”  I nod at the wall, beyond which lies the chamber Aimi, Gennica and Iloru shared while they served Zhylaw.  “And I never knew.  Zhylaw told me he was beyond the needs of the flesh and I believed him.  I never questioned it.  I took it on _faith_.  And I caused so many people pain.  I didn’t know until today that Aimi and Gennica and Iloru had hidden it from me.”

Tomoetu pats my hand.  “Don’t be too hard on yourself, Liaden.  I’m sure Zhylaw ordered them not to tell you.  He told me often that he enjoyed how unsullied you were.  I thought he meant that he hadn’t managed to corrupt your soul.  I’m happy to learn it meant something else.  It makes my old heart light.”

It occurs to me, then, how much Tomoetu has seen.  How much horror.  How much pain.  He didn’t just heal my predecessors.  He took their injuries into himself.  He lived them.  Just as he lived the terminations he caused.  I shudder uncontrollably at the thought.

“Furya can be a chance for all of us to start over.  To forget what we’ve seen and done here.”

Tomoetu smiles.  “I hope so.”

We should all have a chance to start fresh.  Even the Beast.  Perhaps, especially the Beast.  Without him, none of us would be getting this second chance.

A soft chime, the warning bells of the Inner Doors, makes Tomoetu drop my hand guiltily, as though we have been doing something wrong.

The doors open, and Caden takes a step into the sanctum.  He makes a sketchy bow before he says, “Lady Liaden, they’ve brought Lady Aimi’s body.”

I nod.  My duty, not the hollow duty I performed for Zhylaw, but a true duty, the duty to my friend, calls.  I must clean and dress Aimi’s body.  If I hurry, I will have time for a vigil before the women gather for the Choosing.

I could spare myself that, use my vigil for Aimi as an excuse.  But the Beast would think I was hiding, and I do not hide from my duty.  That is another duty of love.  To serve as his concubine, one last time, before I become just another woman of the Armada.  And, in far too short a time, not even that.

No matter how painful, I will not shirk from either duty.

 

I climb into the warm water beside Aimi.  Despite the blood smearing her face – blood that I must have smeared on her – she looks peaceful, and reposed.

My heart is strangely peaceful, too.  Or perhaps I am just too drained with the emotions of the past few hours to have anything left with which to feel.  I lift a dripping sponge and wipe Aimi’s face clean.

Tears slide down my cheeks, to drip into the water.  They leave no ripple to mark their passing.  And they are almost painless.

“I miss you,” I whisper to her.  My voice echoes in the cave of the bathing chamber, an eerie, unworldly resonance that sends a chill down my spine, despite the warm water I sit in.

She does not answer me, and I do not expect her to.  I will never hear her voice again.  Her laughter.  How I miss her.

I prop her head on my knee while I rinse blood out of the stubble of her hair.  Despite the strangeness of it, despite knowing she cannot hear me, I continue speaking to her.  “I never saw you with long hair.  Whatever Zhylaw did to you to make you cut it, it must have happened before I came . . . I’m so sorry, Aimi.  I’m sorry I was so blind . . . sorry you felt you had to hide it from me . . . sorry that I wasn’t strong enough to bear it with you.”

My tears flow faster now, coursing down my cheeks into the water.  “I’m sorry you had so little time with Toal . . . you should have had years . . . it’s my fault, and I’m so very sorry.”

And a soft voice answers me, whispering across the marble and metal surfaces of the bathing chamber.

_Make sure he’s not alone._

I look down into her clean face.  She doesn’t move, doesn’t open her eyes.  But she has answered me.  From wherever she has gone, from wherever her spirit waits, she has answered me.  And her answer washes away my guilt.  She does not level accusations or throw curses from the grave.  She only thinks of the ones she loves.  Giving me an answer so I know she’s heard me, and charging me with making sure the man she loves is cared for.  There is no blame in death.

“I will,” I promise her.

I finish bathing her in silence, and in peace.

 

The sanctum’s chill makes me shiver.  I guide the hover table on which Aimi’s body lies, purified and gowned for her wait, to the door of the concubine’s antechamber and hurry to change out of my damp robes and into clothes fitting for my vigil.

Even dressed in a dry gown, the chill stays with me, ridging my skin with gooseflesh.  The air of the sanctum feels heavy, ominous, and I find myself casting wary glances into dark corners that should hold no terrors, after the familiarity of years.  Why am I suddenly afraid?  The sanctum has always been a place of safety.  Is it that it no longer welcomes me now that the Lord Marshal has dismissed me?  Or is it that the sanctum no longer feels safe, with the memories of Edellis’s invasion and Dame Vaako’s treachery so fresh?

Shivering, I sit down on the bed.  The sanctum is weirdly silent.  And I cannot shake the sense of danger, of being watched by unfriendly eyes.  Finally, I draw Hannelore from her sheath and lay her across my knees.  With her keen edge between me and whatever threatens, I close my eyes and pray.

_Fierce Xia, whose face is the warrior, whose voice is the wolf’s howl, hear me.  Help me be strong.  Help me see what threatens me and know how to meet it.  Help me face my fears and conquer them.  Xia, hear me, help me be strong . . ._

There is no music, and no voice.  I squeeze Hannelore’s handle in frustration.

Then, behind my closed eyes, an image.  A face.  Toal’s face.  My eyes fly open and fix on the mirror, which reflects my puzzlement and dismay.  Toal threatens me?  How?  Another face.  Scales.  Then another.  Scalp-taker.  Lesser officers I don’t recognize.  They multiply into the Legion Vast.  A silent army, arrayed against me.

I pick up Hannelore and clutch her between my breasts in fear.

I understand now.  It is not one enemy that threatens, but all Necromongers.  Tomoetu had it right.  It is not safe for me to remain with the Armada now that I am pregnant.

And the healer was only saying what the Beast has been thinking.  What he has been trying to make me see.

I cannot stay.

The Beast ordered me to leave to protect me.  And he has taken the brunt of my unreasoning anger, without complaint, almost wordlessly.  He knew I would not believe the danger.  He made me see it for myself.

And I have seen.

_Thank you, Xia.  Thank you for showing me the danger and helping me see the path.  Thank you, fierce Xia._

I stand slowly, sheathing Hannelore.  Even she cannot protect me against this foe.  I will have to use cunning and deception.  And call on the allies I did not know I had.

I move to the concubine’s lens and call down to the training room.

“Nazya, would you come up to the Lord Marshal’s chamber?”

Reflected in the lens, her face pinches warily.  “Yes, my Lady.”

“Nazya, it’s nothing—”

But she is already gone.  I should have reassured her first, before issuing the summons.  Now I understand how the Beast feels when all around him react with fear, when he means no harm.  How alone he must feel.

And still he sends me away.  To protect me, and the baby I carry.

Warmth blossoms in my chest, chasing away the chill of the sanctum, and the chill of fear.  It sustains me while I wait for Nazya.

She kneels before she is even through the Inner Doors, blocking them as Caden tries to close them behind her.  Over her bowed head, I give Caden a smile.  Neither his face nor hers were among those Xia showed me.  They are my allies, and I am grateful for them.

“Please don’t kneel to me, Nazya,” I say, beckoning her.  When she rises and moves towards me, Caden finally shuts the doors.

I lead her through the sanctum, into the more intimate setting of my chamber.  Seating myself on the bed, I pat a spot next to me, with increasing insistence, until she finally sits down.

“Lady, I—”

“Be at ease, Nazya.  I didn’t call you here to reprimand you.  I want to thank you.”

Dull color spreads across her cheeks, and she bows her head.  “There’s no need—”

“I think there is.  You spoke to the Lord Marshal on my behalf.  I want you to know how much I appreciate that.  And the bandages you brought me helped save Commander Vaako.  I appreciate that, too.”

She does not look up at me, does not lift her head, but the color staining her cheeks spreads to her ears and down her neck.

“I wondered if you might tell me how you came to be carrying bandages at just that moment?” I ask.

Her thin shoulders hunch, and seeing her motion, seeing how small the shoulders under her black tunic are, makes me realize how young she is.  She can’t be more than eighteen.  A recent convert.

“I followed you, Lady,” she says, sounding miserable.  “I know I shouldn’t have, but I was worried when the Lord Marshal took you from the training room.  You were badly injured and you looked so weak.  I followed you up here and I waited until you and the Lord Marshal came out and I followed you back down to the Great Hall and I saw Lord Toal challenge Lord Vaako and I thought—I thought there might be a need and I’m so sorry I took them!”  She finishes in a wail.

“Nazya, Nazya, I said I didn’t call you here to reprimand you.  Wherever you took the bandages from, I’m glad you took them.  And I’m flattered you were so concerned about me that you followed me.  You showed me true loyalty.  I’d like to reward that loyalty.  Is there anything you desire?”

She glances up at me, eyes stretched wide.  Looking horrified, she shakes her head, then hunches into herself again.

“It can be anything,” I prompt.  “Bella Dust?  Cark?  Jewels?”

I have no right to give her any of those things now.  But I feel no remorse in offering them.  The Beast will not care, and his indifference gives me the freedom to do as I please.

She shakes her head.

“What of this,” I ask gently.  “Would joining the Lord Marshal’s household please you?  Your loyalty has earned you a place at my side, if you want it.”

Her head snaps up.  “Really?”

I smile.  “Would you be my assistant?  The title of handmaiden is more traditional, but it seems . . . confining.  I wouldn’t deprive you of that if it’s what you want, though.”

Her smile breaks like the dawn.  It rounds her thin cheeks, brings a sparkle to her eyes.  Smiling, Nazya is lovely.

“Either, Lady.”

“Good.”  I fold my hands in my lap and finally come to why I brought her here.  “The Lord Marshal has given me a special task.  I will not be accompanying the Armada to the Threshold.  Instead, I go to the Lord Marshal’s homeworld—”

“Furya.”  Nazya nods.

“Furya,” I repeat.  “To begin a colony of Necromongers who will remain behind and convert those who escaped the Campaign.”

I pause to see how she is taking the ruse I’ve invented.  Tomoetu is right about this, too: the fewer people that know of my pregnancy, the better.  So we will have to invent something to explain the preparations for my departure of Furya.  Nazya’s face remains open, attentive, without skepticism or doubt.  The story is plausible, then.

“There is a great deal to do before we reach the drop point.  I would be grateful if you’d assist me in the preparations.  I don’t expect you to come with me, of course . . .”

Her face falls, as I’d hoped it would.

“Well,” I say, pretending to backpedal.  “If you’d like to come, of course . . .”

“Yes, mistress!” she says eagerly.

The title blows cold down my spine.  There is something eerie about the honorific, when I do not deserve it, when I am not what she thinks I am.  Is this the way the Beast feels when I call him Lord?

“When we’re alone, Nazya, call me Liaden.”

Her eyes grow round.  “Yes, mistress.  I’ll try.”

I cannot help a wry smile.  My words to the Beast.  They gall a little, and I can well imagine how they must have irritated him.  How patient he has been with me.

“In an hour, the women of the Armada will present themselves to the Lord Marshal and his commanders for selection.  I’d like you with me then.”  A thought occurs to me; I’ve been callous.  “Unless, of course, you’d like to present yourself.”

Nazya shakes her head.  “I’m spoken for, mistress.”

How little I know of her.  As little I know of any of the Servants.  They have been invisible to me.  As invisible as I have been to those above me.

No longer.

“Then I’ll ask you to meet me in an hour in the Great Hall.  Don’t worry about the training hall or your other duties.  I’ll find someone else to do them.”  I feel a twinge of guilt at reassigning her without any true authority.  But none but the Beast and Tomoetu know I lack it, and neither will argue with me.

She grins.  “Thank you, mistress.”

“No, thank you, Nazya.  It’s good to know that I have someone I can count on.”

After Nazya leaves, I guide the hover table bearing Aimi’s body out of the sanctum.  I expect my journey to be as solitary as my vigil.  Instead, Caden falls into step behind me as I move through the outer chamber.

I stop and glance back at him.  “Caden?”

He bows, an awkward gesture with the war-axe still gripped in his hand.  “Have I offended you, Lady Liaden?”

Remorse touches me with its cold fingers.  I’ve been taking my frustration at the Beast out on Caden.

“No.  Forgive me if I’ve been short with you.”

Caden straightens and stands expectantly.

“I’m taking Lady Aimi’s body down to the Hall of Waiting,” I explain, thinking that will cause him to fall back to his post by the doors.

“The Lord Marshal said I’m to accompany you from now on whenever you leave the chamber.”

He’s assigned me a _bodyguard_?  I almost laugh aloud.  Concubines protect their Lord Marshal; they are not, themselves, protected.

But I had a similar idea, and that is the true reason I asked Nazya to assist me.  Not because I need her help, but because I don’t want to be caught alone again.

“Very well,” I say.  Caden looks distinctly relieved, as though he expected me to object more strenuously.  When I move off again, he follows, trailing two steps behind me.

It is odd to have an armored shadow follow me through the halls of the Basilica.  I’m used to going when and where I please, quickly and quietly, by myself.  But it is oddly comforting to know the Caden is at my back.  Not as comforting as it would be if it were the Beast there.  But comforting all the same.

At the Hall of Waiting, Caden drops back and stops by the doors.  I pass within, into the long hallway that stretches back into blackness.  Nearest the open doors are five rows of benches, where the living can hold vigil.  Further back, the biers of Those Who Wait march away into the dark.

I expect to hold my vigil alone, but a sole, singular figure sits on a bench furthest from the door.

Candlelight from masses of tapers set into the walls plays over the Elemental’s veils, causing them to flicker, and I cannot tell if it is the spectral wind that blows around her, or the shifting light.  Her clever, calculating eyes are steady, however, as she looks at me.

“Forgive me,” I say.  “I didn’t mean to interrupt your vigil.”

“You didn’t.  I’ve been waiting for you,” she says imperturbably.

I stifle a shudder.  There is no escaping her.

Guiding the platform through the benches, I station it before the first row of biers.  Then, reluctantly, I join the Elemental on the bench.

“Is there something I can do for you?” I ask cautiously.

“No, I thought there might be something I could do for you.  You see, I spoke several times to your friend.”  She tips her chin at Aimi’s body.  “I came to know her rather well, and to know how fond she was of you.  When I heard of her death, I thought I might offer you a little solace.  It is something that seems in short supply here.”

I slump on the bench.  I am in need of solace.  My heart feels battered.  By Aimi’s death.  By Zhylaw’s betrayal.  By my dismissal and my rift with the Beast.  By the knowledge of the deception I must practice for the coming months, and my destination at the end of that time.  But of all the people in the Armada, this woman is the last one I would choose to unburden myself to.

“Aimi spoke a great deal about you,” the Elemental says, folding her hands in her pristine white lap.  “She thought very highly of you.  I wondered if you knew that.”

Her words tighten my throat.  I thought I’d cried all my tears for Aimi.  In the Beasts arms, and again in the bath when I washed her.  But I’m wrong.  I have to wipe my eyes hastily with how wrong I am.

“You seem quite astute, Liaden,” the Elemental continues, scrutinizing me as though I were a particularly complicated equation.  “But, if you will forgive me for saying so, somewhat less astute when it comes to understanding the people closest to you.”

I should be offended, but I’m not.  She has the right of it.  My conversation with Tomoetu, and what I have come to realize since then, is fresh proof of that.

“I’ve discovered I was wrong about a great many things,” I say.  “That should please you.”

The Elemental shakes her head.  “I can see that it causes you distress.  Whatever you may think, I wish you no ill.  I truly did come here to see if I could offer you solace.  And to see if, perhaps, you’d changed your mind—”

“About killing myself?” I ask flatly.  “Yes, I have.  But it makes no difference.  I was right about one thing.  I’m not the woman of the prophecy.”

The Elemental casts that clever, calculating gaze over me.  “You think not?”

“I know not,” I say with a shrug.  “The Lord Marshal sends me to Furya.  I do not go with the Armada to the Threshold.  And no child I bear him—” I decide against telling her that I already carry his child.  “—will lead the Legion Vast.  In this ‘Verse or the next.

The Elemental’s veils flicker, and she turns her head to the side.  Calculating?  Mocking?  I cannot tell.

“He’s ordered you to Furya,” she says slowly.

“As I said.”

“Ordering you now and actually letting you go when the time comes are two different things.”

She does not know the Beast if she thinks he will change his mind.  The metal statues of the Basilica are more easily moved.

Her complacency irritates me, but I see little to be gained in arguing with her.  “Time will tell,” I say diffidently.  “The Lord Marshal chooses another concubine today.  Perhaps she is the one.”

The Elemental shakes her head.  “I am confident you are she.  All my calculations point to you.  You will bear Riddick a child.  And his heir will lead the Necromonger horde through the Threshold.”

“His . . . heir?”  The word catches at me.  “You said child before.”

“Did I?  I thought I said ‘dynasty.’  Forgive me if I was inexact.  Prophecy is not a science.  Merely one interpretation—”

“Do you know,” I interrupt her, my voice rising as, somewhere deep, an idea takes hold.  “What the Lord Marshal’s successor is called before he takes the throne?”

“No,” the Elemental admits.

“His Heir.”

An heir the Beast could appoint at any time.  Three months from now as well as three years from now.  He need not lead the Armada to the Threshold.  He could name an Heir now and go to Furya.  With me.

I leap to my feet.  “Would you forgive me?”

The Elemental’s witchy eyes widen, but she nods.

I bow hastily to Aimi’s body.  I will come back later and give her a proper vigil.  Perhaps she would not mind being laid to rest with a Daixian chant.  But she can wait, and what I have to say to the Beast will not. 


	22. Chapter 22

I rush back to the sanctum, my armored shadow clanking at my heels.  Doubtless, Caden wonders about my undignified pace.  I can’t keep myself to a stately walk.  I have to speak to the Beast.  But first I have to change.  I need the white gown, the one he chose for me.  To show him that I belong to him and him alone.

At the Inner Doors, Caden drops back, puffing a little.  I’m glad he doesn’t plan to follow me into the sanctum.  I have no time to waste arguing with him about privacy.

The white gown waits where I left it; it slips on like a second skin.  Does everything of my old life, my former station, wait so readily?  Wait only for me to heal the breech with the Beast and resume my place at his side?

Without hesitation, I take up the concubine’s weapons and put them in their places.  Whether or not the Beast reinstates me, for the moment, I am his only protection.  I will not go without my weapons solely because another woman may have claim to them in a few short hours.

I run a brush through my hair hastily, but leave it down and loose, the way he likes it.  Pulling back a few strands out of my eyes, I reach for the Rift clasp to fasten them.

And I find it in its usual place on my dresser.

Riddick. 

Knowing, somehow, what it is and what it does, he still put it back on my dressing table.  Because he trusts me, even with such a terrible weapon, even after our argument, and my preparations to leave him, he still put it back on my dressing table.  Because he intended me to come back, and wear it again in his defense.

I snatch it up and clip it into my hair.

Pausing only to collect my armored shadow, I rush to the Great Hall.

The Hall is so full that a crowd waits at the doors for admittance.  When the Elites guarding the doors see me emerge from the stairwell, they wave me through the murmuring crowd.

“The Lord Marshal’s waiting for you, Lady Liaden,” one of the Elites says as I reach him.

Is he?

I nod at the Elite and hurry into the Hall.

Within, the crowd is as thick as without.  But, as is customary, they have left a central aisle clear.  Down it, I can see to the Throne, and what waits for me there.

The Beast sits on the Throne, talking with Vaako.  Both men seem at ease, and the faint tension that the Elite’s words engendered ebbs out of my shoulders.  The other four commanders stand a step below Vaako.  Scales smiles at something Daray has said, while they survey the crowd.

It is the largest crowd I can remember seeing in the Great Hall.  Larger than the assembly for Zhylaw’s interment.  Even at a quick glance, the crowd seems oddly divided.  On the right side of the hall stand only women, while on the left, the crowd is mixed, men and women, courtiers and soldiers.

It is only when I see a face I recognize, a face whose beauty makes my breath catch despite our long familiarity, standing amongst all those women, that I realize what I’m seeing.

I make my way toward her and she takes a few steps forward so that she stands at the edge of the horde.

“Gennica, what do you do here among the Aspirants?”

She reaches out and takes one of my hands between her own.  “Li, how are you?”

“I’m well, thank you.  Why are you here?”

Why would she present herself for choosing after what Zhylaw did to her?  She is under no compulsion to be here.

Her wide, gray-green eyes slide over my face, down my neck, lighting for a moment on each of the marks I still wear.  “They said,” she breathes.  “But I did not believe it.  Not you.  Not Saint Liaden.”

Despite the sympathy I feel for her, I stiffen.  “No?” I ask coolly.  “Not me?”

Gennica shakes herself.  “Forgive me.  I only meant—”

I nod.  I know what she meant.  Liaden, the plain one.  The Lord Marshal’s gray ghost.  Unworthy of his touch, or love, or anything but duty.

But I am not that woman anymore.

“Forget that,” I say.  “Are you sure you want to be here?”

Her eyes unfocus, and, for a second, I glimpse the place she must have gone when Zhylaw hurt her.  A place not unlike the UnderVerse.

“Yes,” she says slowly.  “There’s nothing else for me.”

Sympathy crashes back over me in a wave.  “Oh, Gennica, I’ll help you find a place in the Armada.”

Her smooth brow furrows.  “Where?  As a navigator?  A pilot?  No, this is what I know.  This is what I am.”

Her loss strikes at me.  How can it not, when I felt the same loss at the Beast’s dismissal?  But I would never have given myself to another man out of despair.  I would have made a place for myself, somewhere, somehow.  That she cannot fills me with sorrow.

“I understand,” I say, because I do.  “Good luck to you.”

She squeezes my hand.  “Li.”  She drops her voice to a whisper.  “Vaako.”

I nod.  If it is Vaako she wants, I’ll bring her to his attention.  And if he doesn’t choose her, maybe she’ll accept my help finding another station.

When she releases my hand, I move on down the long corridor to the Throne.  A new addition to the noise trailing me, a lighter sound than the clanking of Caden’s armor, makes me glance back over my shoulder.

Nazya follows me, in step with Caden.  She has changed from her plain black and gray uniform into a courtier’s black scalecloth gown.  Around her waist she wears a jeweled girdle, from which depends a flange of sharp, metal points.  The Handmaiden’s Keys.  They open any door in the Basilica, but they are also effective weapons if gripped in the fist and splayed between the fingers like claws.  I haven’t seen them since Fainche’s handmaiden was executed, along with her mistress, four years ago.

I smile to myself.  Teshi the Housekeeper has done her usual, efficient job, taking this latest change to the Lord Marshal’s household in stride.  And Nazya looks transformed.  She meets my gaze, and when I wink at her, she smiles broadly.

With my allies at my back, I mount the steps to the Throne.

On those steps, my enemies stand arrayed.  The great men of the Faith.  They would kill me without hesitation if they knew what I carry.  Ignorant, they smile at me.

Toal steps forward to lay a heavy hand on my shoulder.  “Aimi looks beautiful.  If you have time, would you sit Vigil with me tonight?”

“Of course.”

He squeezes my shoulder and steps back, his eyes once again on the crowd of women clustered on the right side of the Hall.  The Beast has ordered him to choose from among them.  Does he have any qualms about replacing Aimi so quickly?  If he does, it doesn’t show on his face.  He is a good soldier, and he will follow orders.

If I could obey the Beast so readily . . .

I step up onto the wide tread below the Throne.  The Beast’s gaze moves from Vaako to me, and his eyes chill.

I sink into an obeisance.

“Liaden,” he says, clipped and cold.

He is angry with me.  So very angry.  I don’t need the Collar to sense his rage, held tightly in check beneath that wintry tone.

“My Lord Marshal.”  I bow my head, flaring my skirts with my hands and bending my knees, until I am in the deepest obeisance I have ever seen anyone make, only a breath above the cold stone of the steps.  “May I beg a private word with you?”

He makes a low sound.  “Since you begged.”

This is the way to reach him.  To placate his fury and heal the rift.  I will have to humble myself.  A small enough price to resume my place at his side.

He rises in a creak of leatheren and holds his hand out to me.

I glance back over my shoulder, to where Caden and Nazya kneel on the step below me.  Nazya looks up, and when I mouth _stay here_ at her, she nods.

Making a mental note to work out some hand signals with Nazya, I take the Beast’s hand and lead him through the Lord’s Walk to the Concubine’s training room, where we can speak in privacy.

His hand is warm, so warm, strong fingers curled tightly but not crushingly around mine.  The heat of him stands in sharp contrast to the cold of the corridor I lead him through, the chamber I lead him into.  How I’ve missed his warmth.

I shut the doors, then turn to face him.

He’s looking away, at the dais where I was wounded.  Where Aimi died.  I know what he is thinking, even though his face reveals nothing.  He’s remembering watching me crawl through my own blood to Aimi’s side.  I can see the memory tighten his shoulders, and his fear for me blows through the room in an icy draft.  Perhaps this was not the best place to bring him.  But it is my place.  And Aimi does not haunt it.  Only the ghost of his anger fills this room.

“I’m a danger to you,” I say softly.

His silver eyes flick to me, then back to the dais.  “Yeah,” he rumbles.

“Forgive me for not seeing it sooner.”

He exhales heavily.  “That all you got to say?”

“No.”  I draw close to him, close enough to feel the heat that rises off him, close enough to smell the faint musk of his skin and the leatheren he wears, close enough to see the pulse that beats hard in his throat.  “I will go to Furya as you command—”

His eyes narrow.  “You thought you had a choice?”

“—gladly,” I continue, ignoring his caustic growl.  “Willingly.  Without protest.  But please, please come with me.”

“Told you, I’ll meet you—”

Shaking my head, I interrupt him.  “Come now.  Name a successor.  Vaako.  Toal.  Either of them will make a fine Lord Marshal.  Name one of them as your Heir and come to Furya with me.”

He tilts his head, regarding me, and I would give anything to be able to feel his thoughts again.  What goes on behind those inscrutable silver eyes?

“What happened to keepin’ what you kill?” he asks flatly.

“The last four Lords Marshal have come to the Throne that way.  But not all.  Covu named Oltovm his successor.  He even trained Oltovm for a time, the two ruling as one.  And Oltovm named Nephemil when he tired of lordship.”

“That so?”

I nod eagerly.  He seems receptive to the idea.  He hasn’t snapped at me or rejected the idea out-of-hand.  A blaze of hope fills my chest.

“The only difficulty I see,” I say.  “Is making sure that the Armada continues to the Threshold after you step down, instead of returning to the Campaign.”

He lifts a dark eyebrow.  “That the only one?”

I reach for him.  I want so badly to feel his warmth, to touch him again and have him hold me now that his rage has abated.  Now that I know that I won’t have to do without him.

He drops his eyes to follow my hand.  When he lifts them, the coldness in them freezes me in mid-gesture.

“Thought you didn’t want me touchin’ you,” he says.

The winter tone of his voice ruffles down my spine, forcing a shiver out of me.  Perhaps I was wrong about his rage abating . . .

“Forgive me.  I shouldn’t have said that.”

He crosses his arms over his chest, and I realize I haven’t reached him at all.

“You did,” he says softly, looking away from me, speaking almost to himself.  “An’ you meant it.  You didn’t want my fucking hands on you—” His voice drops into that abyssal rumble, and his eyes snap back to me.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” I repeat, spreading my hands placatingly.  “It wasn’t true.  It isn’t true.”

In his eyes, I see his fury ignite, burning through the icy blanket of control.

“Fuck you!” he roars.  “You don’t want me!  Don’t want the baby—!”

“That’s not true!”  I shout back at him.  Placating him isn’t working, and this isn’t a battle I can afford to lose.  “I love you!  And I want the baby.  You _dismissed_ me—”

“The thought of it made you sick!”

That one moment.  That single betrayal by my body.  I didn’t know how deeply it had wounded him.

“I was shocked!  It never occurred to me that I might get pregnant so quickly.”

“’Cause you don’t want it,” he grits out between clenched teeth.

“No, because I never thought about it!  I didn’t even know I was fertile.  Did you?”

His nostrils flare.  “Yeah,” he admits.

“Well, I didn’t.  So forgive me if—”

“No,” he says with such glacial finality that I sputter to a halt in mid-apology.

“What?”

“I don’t forgive you, Liaden.”

He brushes past me, slamming the doors open with his palm.

I stare after him in shock and horror.  He won’t forgive me?  Have I destroyed everything that is or could be between us?  In one unguarded moment?  With one uncontrolled physical reaction?  No, that cannot be.

I rush after him.  “Riddick, wait.  Please.”

He pauses but doesn’t turn back to me.

With shaking fingers, I touch his shoulder.  I peer around him, and when he averts his face, touch his chin with my fingertips.  “Please look at me,” I whisper.

He favors me with a hard silver glare.

“I’m sorry that I hurt you—”

“Why?” he growls.

“Why?”  I look up at him, nonplussed.

“Why d’you want me to come to Furya now?”

“Because I don’t want to be without you.”

“Not so I can take the baby off your hands?”  He nods at my belly.

“No!”  I cup my hand protectively over my navel, over the spot where, deep inside me, tiny life burgeons.  “I want your baby.  But I want to have it _with_ you.  I don’t want to be without you—”

“Prove it,” he growls.

“What?”

He pushes his face down to mine, until I can feel the hot brush of his breath across my skin.  “Prove.  It.”

I hold those burning-cold eyes.  “How?”

“Work it out.”  He turns away again.  I trail after him as he makes his way back to the Great Hall, my mind frantically churning.  How do I prove that I want his child?

 

All heads turn to us as we enter the Hall through the back doors.  I shiver under the disconcerting scrutiny of so many eyes.  The Beast seems unaffected.  Without hesitation, he strides to the Throne.  Before seating himself, he hands me up into my place at his right hand.

Even enraged, he still shows me such honor it makes my chest tight.  I kneel carefully, tucking my skirts beneath my knees, but do not bow my head or fold my hands in my lap the way I did when I sat beside Zhylaw.  I lift my chin and gaze out over the court.  The Beast has given me this honor, the least I can do is show the courtiers my pride at being so favored.

The Beast sits next to me heavily.  His elbow settles on the armrest with a soft whump, and his hand sinks into my hair.  Brushing the mass aside, he curls his hand around the nape of my neck.

I glance at him in surprise.  Does he believe me now?  Has he forgiven me so quickly?

No.  I can see the answer in the tightness around his eyes and mouth.  He touches me to carry on the pretense, and, perhaps, because he misses the tactile comfort of my body, but he has not forgiven me.  Has not forgotten.  He may never forget.  I may be able to convince him, to prove myself to him again, but he will not forget.  I should have realized the gravity of my mistake sooner.

Loyalty.  Loyalty is everything to him.  He rewarded it from the start.  It was what he wanted from his Kyra—

_Are you with me?_

The one thing he asked of me—

_You’ll stay with me?  Wherever I go?_

I should have remembered.  I should have realized – before I let my confusion and anger speak in words that he will not forgive – that what he needs most from me is not my love, but my loyalty.

How will I prove that loyalty to him again?

“There some ceremony for this?” he growls, low, so the commanders standing nearby will not overhear.  His eyes roam the crowd of women filling the hall.

“Yes, my Lord.  Shall I begin?”

He nods.

Remembering back to my own Choosing sends a fresh shiver through me.  But I am not among those gathered on the floor, and this day will not end with the Collar searing my flesh.

It may end with something worse if I cannot convince the Beast of my loyalty.

“The Lord Marshal thanks the Aspirants who have presented themselves for choosing,” I say, pitching my voice to be heard to the far end of the Great Hall.  As my words roll over the crowd, it falls silent, and the disconcerting weight of so many eyes presses on me once more.  I lean into the Beast’s hand, glad of his support.

“In presenting yourselves today,” I continue.  “You walk in the footsteps of six generations of women.  Since the days of Covu the Transcended, concubines have sat at their lord’s right hand.  They have advised their lords, protected them, given their lives in their lords’ defense, and followed their lords into True Death.  This is the concubine’s duty and her sacred trust.”

I pause and let my words sink in.  Looking over the Aspirants, I meet the eyes – black, blue, green, brown, and the rare amber of Aquila – of as many as I can, before I go on.

“In presenting yourselves for choosing, you agree to uphold this trust.  You will have no other concerns, no other duties.  You will devote yourselves, first and only, to the comfort and welfare of your lord.  But.”  I pause again and look over the crowd sharply.  “There is no going back.  The bond between concubine and her lord is unbreakable.  Once you have been chosen and given your lord your vow, you are his forever.  In life.  In Death.  ‘Til UnderVerse come.”

“’Til UnderVerse come,” the Aspirants unexpectedly chorus.

“Except if they’re dismissed,” the Beast whispers, leaning toward me so I feel the hot brush of his breath across my cheek.

“I wouldn’t know, my Lord,” I respond quietly.  “No concubine has been dismissed from her lord’s service and allowed to live . . . before.”

He leans back into the Throne, not looking at me, not reacting.  Only his thumb moves, minutely, on my neck.  I cannot tell what that tiny gesture means.

“If any here feel they cannot uphold this trust, please leave now,” I say to the Aspirants.  “There is no shame in leaving.  Only in failing your lord.”

A shame I still feel acutely.

I wait, expecting at least a few of the women to slink out.  But none of them move.  I glance over them, and then at the Beast, in surprise.  Is his attraction so great that all these women vie for his favor?  That all of them would be willing to die for him?  Perhaps I should step aside without a fight.  Surely amongst all these women there is one who will serve him better than I have.

The Beast meets my eyes and shrugs.  “Go on,” he murmurs.

My mind is blank.  If there is anything more to the ritual, I have forgotten it.  “Do you want them all to present themselves to you now?” I ask.

The Beast frowns faintly.  “That all there is to it?”

I nod.

The Beast glances over the crowd of women.  “Have ‘em line up.”  He slants his eyes at me.  “Let’s see how well they’re trained.”

Trained?  Does he plan to put them through their paces the way he does his legions?  Surely he does not think _I_ have trained all these women?

He says nothing more, gives me no further direction, as is his wont, leaving me to puzzle out what to do.  I grind my teeth in frustration.  Perhaps whomever he picks will be better able to fathom his unspoken commands.  I silently wish her luck.

“Nazya,” I say in a low tone.  She immediately looks up at me from her post a step below the Throne.  “Please bring the training pins.  The Lord Marshal would like to see the Aspirants’ skills.”

Nazya curtseys gracefully, and slips off behind the Throne towards the Concubines’ training hall.

“Thought you didn’t want any help,” the Beast murmurs to me, his silver eyes tracking Nazya’s exit.

“Dame Vaako’s attempt on my life changed my mind.”

The Beast’s eyes snap to me.  “Did it?”

I hold that white-hot stare.  “I have been wrong about many things.  Not the least of which is the danger I am in, or how best to protect myself.”

The Beast’s eyes soften, but his mouth tightens and he looks away.  Have I reached him?  Does he understand my contrition and remorse?

“Get on with it,” he grunts.

I look back out over the gathered women, and the mixed crowd that swells the other side of the Hall.  There is no space in the Hall for the Aspirants form a line with so many courtiers crowded around.  The courtiers will have to leave.  I control a smile.

“The Lord Marshal thanks all who have come to witness the Choosing.  Regretfully, in order for the Lord Marshal to assess the Aspirants’ mettle, we will need to clear the Hall.”  I nod at the honor guard who flank the Throne’s steps.  When they realize what I mean, they wade down into the crowd of courtiers and herd them towards the doors.  Slowly, the Hall clears, leaving only the Aspirants and a few Elites milling around.

A step below me, Vaako sighs with relief, as though the courtiers’ departure has made the air of the Hall more breathable.  It would not have occurred to me that he would find their presence as oppressive as I do.  Feeling an unexpected sense of kinship, I say,  “Would the Aspirants please form a line—”

“Two lines,” the Beast mutters.

“—two lines,” I correct myself, and realizing what the Beast intends, I clarify.  “Facing each other.”

The Beast’s hand tightens on my neck and he leans toward me to whisper, “You’re very good at your job.”

Is that what he thinks?  Did he dismiss me only to force me away from danger, instead of because of my many failings?

With a creak of leatheren, he rises from the Throne.  He nods at Toal and Vaako, who flank him as he paces down the steps towards the assembled women.  Since he has not indicated I should accompany him, I remain seated on the right flange of the Throne, and watch him walk away, into the crowd of women from whom he will chose my replacement.

My hands ball into fists against my thighs.  No.  I will not let another woman take my place at his right hand.  It is where I belong.  And I will fight for my place, in his life and in his heart.

“My Lord?”

He turns and looks at me.  “Yeah?”

I bow my head, hoping that he will understand I want to speak to him privately.  He moves so silently that I cannot hear him climb back up the steps to me, but I feel him, the massy presence of him, draw near, a moment before his hand descends to stroke my hair.

“What d’you want, Liaden?” he asks softly.

I look up so I can see his quicksilver eyes, so I can gauge his reaction to each word.

“I would like to present myself for consideration,” I whisper.

His eyes narrow.  “What?”

I wait, hoping that his lightning-quick mind will make the connections behind my request, so that I do not have to say them aloud and risk being overheard.

His eyes shift, right, then left.  He is thinking, considering.  Is he following the path my mind has already gone down?  He dismissed me because I refused to leave his side.  But if he would name an Heir and accompany me to Furya, I would go willingly.  He would not need to dismiss me.  I don’t expect him to retract the dismissal.  It is not in his nature.  But he could choose me again.

“That what you want?” he asks finally.  “A test?”

Prove it, he said.  Prove my loyalty.  Prove that I deserve to sit at his right hand.  If this is the way to prove myself to him, I will endure any test he devises.

“Yes.”

He watches me for a moment, and I cannot tell what thoughts move behind those lambent eyes.  “Okay, Liaden.  C’mon.”

Cold fingers walk down my spine at the thought of how he might test me, but I straighten my shoulders and meet his eyes resolutely.  I will not cede my place without a fight.

He turns and holds out his elbow.  Sliding off my seat, I take it and walk down the steps with him to join Toal and Vaako.

We walk between the two rows of Aspirants.  Most of them have eyes only for the Beast, Toal and Vaako.  But a few meet my eyes, too, and project challenge.

When we come to the third or fourth of these, I shiver.  What will my life be like if the Beast picks one of these women?  Will I have to watch her supplant me?  Gennica, Iloru, Aimi and I had no rivalries.  I know now that was because Zhylaw allowed none.  He used us each in the way he desired and brooked no trespass into the domains he chose for each of us.  He did not even let me suspect how he made Gennica serve him.  Will the Beast do the same?  Will he relegate me to some small corner of his life?  Perhaps nothing more than mother of his child?

The Beast pauses and glances down at me.  Then he turns his head and looks at the woman we have just passed, whose cold blue eyes projected such challenge.

“Toal?  Vaako?”

The two commanders look to the Beast, and when he nods at the blue-eyed woman, at her.  Toal shrugs, and Vaako shakes his head.

“You can go,” the Beast says to the woman.

She stares at him, her mouth falling open in shock, and I have to control my expression tightly to keep my face from mirroring hers.  He’s dismissed her?  Merely because she looked at me challengingly?

The Beast moves on, ignoring the woman’s shock, and when she doesn’t move, he nods at one of the milling Elite, who snaps to attention and escorts the woman out of the Hall.

“Any more of those,” the Beast murmurs to me.  “You let me know.”

“Yes, my Lord,” I manage to say, through my shock.  He refuses to consider any woman who would challenge me?  My head spins with confusion.  What does he plan?

Four more women look at me with challenge, or disdain, in their eyes before we reach the end of the Hall.  Each time, before I say a word, the Beast dismisses them.  He watches each Aspirant closely, and his silver eyes miss nothing.

At the end of the long row, I finish my tally and whisper to the Beast, “One hundred and fifty-two.”

He glances down at me and amusement ripples through his argentate eyes.  “I can count.”

I bow my head to hide my chagrin.  Of course he has made his own tally.

“How many make your short list, Liaden?”

Confused, I lift my head and look at him.  “What do you mean?”

“Who d’you think I should pick?”

 _Me_ , I almost say, but I clamp my tongue firmly between my teeth before it betrays me.  I look dully down the double row.  There are many here who could please him.  What does he want?  There are rare beauties like Gennica.  There are several Servants, who could see competently to his physical needs.  There are even two red-robed Healers, who would be valuable additions to his household, given how often he is wounded.

Slowly, grudgingly, I point them all out, adding three women legionnaires I’ve noticed, since their martial skills would be valuable in his defense.  The Beast listens, his head tilted towards me, his eyes tracking down the double row to light on each woman I describe.  A small smile tilts the corners of his mouth as I finish.

He turns his head so his mouth brushes my ear.  “Any of them do a better job than you?”

Is this how he will test me?  Will he make _me_ chose my successor?

“I cannot say,” I say stiffly.  “I do not know any of them personally except Gennica.  I cannot speak for their skills.”

He chuckles, a warm vibration across the sensitive surfaces of my inner ear.  And then I feel the wet brush of his tongue before he straightens.  What is he doing?  Is this part of the test?

“Let’s see,” he says.  With his free hand, he beckons Nazya, who has returned with a tray of training pins.  He silently directs her to hand pins to the first ten pairs of woman.  When they look at him curiously, he nods.  “The losers can go.”

With varying degrees of skill and determination, the twenty women face off.  They have all been trained during Education after their conversion, but few of them have handled anything other than a gun.  One woman hefts the pin over her head the way she would a dagger and charges her opponent.  I grimace.  She would have to be very good or very lucky to get a strike in that way.

She is neither, and her opponent ducks under the charge, sweeps the woman’s feet out from under her, and holds a pin to the woman’s throat.

The Beast nods at the fallen woman and an Elite immediately moves to escort her out.  To her opponent, a plain, dark-haired girl in the uniform of a Servant, the Beast says, “What’s your name?”

Evelyn?  I have seen her before.  She came to the concubine’s training.  She asked if the Beast was kind.  Was that only this morning?

“Avalyn,” the girl says, her brown eyes wide but steady on the Beast’s face.

“Go sit on the steps,” the Beast tells her.

Nazya collects Avalyn’s pins and passes them on to the next pair.

Slowly, the long line whittles down.  The Beast watches each pair fight for a moment or two.  Assessing.  Often he dismisses both of them before either has emerged the victor.  For a few, he stops the fight and sends one to sit on the steps with Avalyn while the other leaves with an Elite.  Only one fight does he watch to its conclusion.  The two women are both legionnaires, highly skilled and well-matched.  He lets them fight for several minutes, and when one loses her training pin, he draws blades from his own boot and tosses one to each combatant.

Finally, one of them, a dark-skinned juggernaut with arms almost as thick as the Beast’s, draws first blood.

“Enough,” the Beast grunts.  “Both of you can go.  But I want to see you before training tomorrow.  In the main hall.”

The victor wipes sweat from her eyes and says boldly, “I won.  Why won’t you consider me, Lord Marshal?”

I expect the Beast to snap at her, but instead he smiles.  “’Cause I got something else in mind for you.”

The woman’s jaw knots and I can tell the effort not to argue with the Beast costs her a great deal.  Finally, she snaps a salute, hands the blade back to the Beast, and stalks from the Hall.

Curious, I whisper, “May I ask what you have in mind for her?”

“She’ll lead a new division,” the Beast says, his eyes going to the next pair of combatants.  “Women Elites.”

I remember him saying that the women legionnaires would do better training on their own.  I did not think, however, that with everything else he has had on his mind, that he’d remember.

But if he plans to reorganize the Legion Vast, does that mean he will stay to lead them to the Threshold, or leave them to come with me to Furya?

Wondering, my chest tight with worry, I look to the next pair, and find Gennica’s blue-green eyes looking back at me.

“Hello, Gennica,” I say warmly.  “Commander Toal, Commander Vaako, you remember Gennica.”

Both commanders bow to Gennica, and she smiles brilliantly at Vaako as she takes a firm grip on her pins.

I glance at Vaako to gauge his interest, but he is not watching Gennica.  His eyes stray back to the steps, and linger on a girl who sits a little apart from the others.  She wears a healer’s red robes, and their color spreads to her cheeks when she sees Vaako watching her.

“Think he’s made his choice,” the Beast whispers to me, his mouth against my ear again.

A pang of sadness shoots through my chest.  The Beast is right.  Vaako is not interested in Gennica, despite her beauty.  She will have to find another place within the Armada.

I nod fractionally, a movement I know he will see and feel with his cheek so close to mine.

“Enough,” the Beast says to Gennica and her partner.  “You can both go.”

Gennica’s opponent meekly surrenders her pins to Nazya and moves towards the doors.  But Gennica doesn’t move; she seems frozen.

I reach out to her, releasing the Beast’s arm so I can grasp both of her hands with mine.  “Please come see me tomorrow,” I say to her, despite having no idea where I will be or what I will be doing tomorrow.  “I’ll help you any way I can.”

Gennica’s eyes focus on me.  They glitter, overbright.

The Beast’s hands suddenly slide down my arms.  He draws my hands out of Gennica’s and pulls me back a step, against the warm solidity of his chest.  “C’mon, Liaden,” he growls.

I glance over my shoulder at his face.  There’s a flurry of movement, and when I look back at Gennica, she stands, blinking, looking stunned.  The Beast holds her two pins in his hand.

An Elite takes Gennica’s arm and leads her away.  I turn in the Beast’s arms and look up at him.

His eyes follow Gennica to the door, then snap back to me.

“You don’t meet her without me,” he growls.

Flabbergasted, I stare at him.  “I’ve known Gennica for years—”

He lowers his face to mine and says, “She smells wrong.  I don’t want you alone with her.”

“Zhylaw hurt her badly,” I whisper.

The Beast’s eyes search mine for a moment.  “She was gonna hurt you just then.”

A chill runs through me.  What did Gennica do behind my back?  Why did the Beast take her pins?

“Hear me, Liaden?” the Beast growls.

I nod, looking earnestly up into his eyes.  I will never again doubt his concern, or flout his orders.  If I had listened to him, Aimi would still be alive.  “I will not meet with her alone.”

The Beast relaxes visibly.  He hands Gennica’s pins to Nazya, and envelops my hand in his.  “C’mon, let’s finish this.”

Vaako and Toal fall into step beside us as we move on down the double-row, to the next pair, and the next.  The line of women sitting on the bottom step of the Throne grows even as the numbers in front of us shrink.  Finally, when twenty women sit on the steps, we reach the last pair.  Without consulting Vaako or Toal, without watching more than a few seconds of their sparring, the Beast dismisses both of them.  Does he tire of the test already?

“There is one more Aspirant to be tested,” I murmur to him, as we turn back toward the Throne.  “Do you wish me to fight the best of them?”

With the two legionnaires gone, the best that remains is an older woman in the tight gray uniform of a pilot.  Seeing her fight, I know she has lost the quickness of youth.  But she is cunning, seasoned.  She bested her opponent with a maneuver I have never seen before, but recognize as a Sanchit fighting technique.  Beating her will be hard, but not impossible.  I still have the speed of youth, and I’m good with the pins.

The Beast glances down at me.  “Kinda obvious, don’t you think?”

He has a point.  We have both taken pains to keep our rift a secret.  But I find I am eager for the fight anyway.  To vent some of my tension and anger.  I have no reason to be angry.  My situation is of my own making.  But I am angry all the same.

While I’m turning over ways to challenge the pilot without letting my dismissal be known, the Beast says, “Toal.  Vaako.  Make your choices.”

Without hesitation, Vaako moves to stand before the healer, and holds his hand out to her.  “Mhina,” he says.

With her cheeks glowing brighter than her robes, the girl rises from the steps and takes Vaako’s hand.  She stands beside him, her fair head bowed.  He says something to her, too softly to be heard, and her head snaps up.

“Yes,” she says tremulously.

I smile.  Whatever Vaako has said, he has swayed her.  I have dreaded this moment, dreaded the possibility of having to watch another woman forced to become a concubine.  As I was forced.  Seeing Vaako persuade his choice with a few soft words makes my heart light.

With my hand clasped firmly in his, the Beast witnesses their vows.  Then he turns to Toal.

Toal meets the Beast’s eyes, and the Beast goes still at the bleakness there.  He reaches out and grasps Toal’s armored shoulders.

“None of them can replace her,” Toal mutters.

“I know,” the Beast replies.  “I’m not askin’ that.”

Toal shrugs.  “Any of them.”

“Chione,” the Beast says, in his deep, carrying rumble.

A dark-haired Aquilian in the black scalecloth of a courtier rises from the steps.  She walks gracefully towards the three of us, but her amber eyes are on Toal, and I can see why the Beast selected her.  He has missed nothing.

As Chione nears, I can see another reason the Beast selected her.  She has a kind face, around those unusual amber eyes.  She will take care of Toal.  I smile at her, and she gives me a gentle smile in return.

In his baritone rumble so like the Beast’s, Toal accepts Chione’s vow and gives his in return.  The words hit me like blows.  If I’m successful, if I can convince the Beast of my loyalty, will he give me his vow?  Or will he leave me in the same limbo as before?

As if sensing my turmoil, the Beast wordlessly reaches out and pulls me a step closer, tucking me into his side.  His warm arm wraps around my back.  He says nothing to me, listening as Toal finishes his vow.

But I feel a spark of hope.

The Beast nods to Toal and Chione, silently dismissing them.  Toal salutes, then looks at me.

“I go to sit Vigil,” he says.  “I hope you’ll join me.”

“When she’s finished here,” the Beast answers, before I can even open my mouth to respond.  “Gonna be a while.”

Toal nods and turns on his heel.  He does not offer his arm to Chione, or wait for her, and she hastily follows him, lifting the skirts of her gown so she can keep up with his long stride.

Although neither would appreciate it, I offer a silent prayer to Xia for both of them.  May Toal find some solace in Chione’s kindness.  And may he treat her kindly in return.  She deserves more than grief and rage and the dregs of his affection.

As do I.

I am suddenly grateful to the Beast.  Grateful that he has given me more than grief and rage and the dregs of his affection for Kyra.  He has not given me his heart, but he has let me feel his need, and let me fill that need, if only for a few hours.  It is not enough, but it is something.

Perhaps, if he would let me back into his life, it could become enough.

His deep rumble drags me out of my thoughts.  “C’mon, Liaden.  Time for the test.”

I control a start of surprise.  Has it not even begun?

*

The Beast escorts me up the steps, past the waiting eighteen, and seats me at his right hand before he sinks onto the Throne.

“Tea, Liaden,” he rumbles.  “And get yourself somethin’ to eat.”

Have I not just eaten?  Surely it has only been a few hours since I lay in his arms and let him feed me.  But even as I reject the idea of eating again so soon, my body betrays me.  My stomach grumbles and I hastily beckon Nazya.

“Tea and a light meal.”

As though born to her new station, Nazya makes a graceful obeisance and glides away soundlessly.

While we wait for Nazya to return, the Beast calls each woman up to the top step.  He listens while they tell him their names, their rank within the Armada, and their homeworld.  The last question clearly startles several of the women.  They are as little used to talking about their past as I am.

As he listens to each of them, he cups my nape in a gesture so familiar now that its absence would chill me.  His thumb strokes up and down the long tendon in the back of my neck, rhythmic and hypnotizing.

His face and voice betray nothing other than polite interest as he listens to each woman.  I watch him closely, trying to gauge his reactions.  Which ones capture his attention?  Which are true challengers to my station?

His hand tightens on my neck when Avalyn presents herself.  She is also Aquilian, but lacks Chione’s striking coloring.  In the gray and black uniform of a Servant, she is plain and undistinguished.  What draws the Beast’s attention to her?  Is it merely that she fought well?

With small shifts of his body, the Beast betrays his interest in several others.  Widema, the older pilot from Coalsack.  Cays, a healer I vaguely remember training with Tomoetu.  Nadie, a courtier from Jeranda whose fiery beauty makes me stiffen.  And, strangest of all, a tiny brown-haired girl from Helion, Zetany, whose conversion is so recent, the purification marks on the sides of her neck are still healing.  The Beast actually smiles at her.  What can he see in her that I cannot?  She is barely more than a child, just old enough to convert.  She has a piquant, pointed face, but is no beauty.  What draws him to her?

As I am puzzling through his reactions to the Aspirants, Nazya returns with a hover table full of food.  She guides it up the steps, and at a gesture from the Beast, positions it in front of us.

“Marilke,” the Beast says.

A girl rises from the line of Aspirants sitting on the bottom step and approaches the Throne.

The Beast nods at the left flange of the Throne.  “Kneel.”

I control a shiver, trying hard not to let my mind stray to the last time the Beast commanded me to kneel.  Oblivious, the girl climbs onto the flange.  Her round face tightens with discomfort.  There is an art to kneeling, and I doubt any of these Aspirants know it.  Even I have trouble kneeling for long periods, like when the Beast held me so tightly on his lap . . .

As though he can sense my wayward thoughts, the Beast strokes his fingers down the side of my neck.  In a rumble rich with amusement, he says, “Tea, Liaden.”

Trying to distract myself from the growing heat in my belly, I make him tea with full ceremony, offering him the Tray of Leaves first, with my head bowed, and then carefully measuring and mixing his selection.  He’s chosen Gauvray Black again.  It can become bitter if left to steep for too long, and I watch it carefully, scooping out the leaves with a strainer when the water has reached a rich caramel brown.

The color of his skin, I realize, when I hand him the tea cup.

He takes a sip and nods.  “Perfect.  Marilke, you try it.”

He tests me with tea?  Will he chose the woman who makes him the best cup?

Whatever his criteria, Marilke does not pass.  Her hands shake so badly that she nearly spills the Tray of Leaves when she offers it to him.  Nazya and I spend long moments straightening it while Marilke makes the tea.  She lets it steep for far too long.  It is nearly black when she offers it to him, and my mouth puckers with the thought of how bitter it will be.

The Beast sips and discovers for himself.  He swallows with evident effort.  “You can go,” he growls.

I have to bow my head to hide my smile.

The pop of Marilke’s knees as she climbs off the Throne brings my head up sharply.  The sound is close to a projectile weapon, and it occurs to me that perhaps we are taking a terrible risk letting these women so close to the Beast.  My eyes sweep across the row of remaining faces at the base of the steps.  Their faces are open, hopeful, a little nervous.  None of them look like an assassin.  But, then, neither did Edellis.

I work my blow-pipe out of my sleeve, load a dart into it and tuck my hands around it, holding it at the ready in my lap.

“Maybe food’s safer,” the Beast mutters, as he watches Marilke go.  “Bayzli.”

While the next girl rises from the row and makes her way up the steps to the Throne, the Beast glances at me.  “Liaden, eat,” he says softly.

I control a start.  Focusing on the test, and the potential danger, I had forgotten his command.  “Yes, my Lord.”

One-handed, still clutching my blow-pipe in my lap, I take a skewer of saurin fruit.

Bayzli climbs onto the flange of the Throne, sitting as awkwardly as Marilke did, her back perilously close to the long spines of the Tree of Pain.  Swallowing my mouthful of fruit, I start to warn her, but then remember myself.  I owe her nothing.  It is _my_ position she seeks.

“Let’s try some of that fish,” the Beast says to her.

Bayzli nods.  Reaching out, she takes a pronged fork between thick fingers.  She wears the red and black uniform of a Weaver, and I wonder absently how she can be any good at her craft with such clumsy-looking hands.

She spears Aquilian anchovies on the fork.  One after another.  Four.  Five.  Too many.  She will never fit that many into the Beast’s mouth.  The Beast watches her, his eyes narrowing.  Bayzli makes the mistake of glancing at him instead of focusing on serving, and his glare makes her hand shake as she lifts the overloaded skewer.

Two anchovies splat into the Beast’s lap.

Her olive cheeks growing red with mortification, Bayzli tries to rush the skewer into the Beast’s mouth.  But I can see that the angle is all wrong; she won’t even get one anchovy into his mouth at that angle.  Even as I reach out to stop her, she jabs the point of the skewer into the soft corner of the Beast’s mouth.

We all freeze.

“Oh, no, no,” Bayzli wails.

She drops the skewer, which lands greasily on the Beast’s arm as he reaches for his injured mouth.  Bayzli recoils in horror, knocking into the hover table, which rocks, despite its stabilizers.  A small servery of pastries tips, in turn toppling the pitcher of Cark.  I reach across the banquet table, trying to stop the tumbling domino procession.  With one hand around the Cark pitcher and the other supporting a crystal plate of fruit, I glance back over my shoulder at the Beast.

He’s trying to fend off Bayzli, who is dabbing madly at his bleeding mouth.

“Firm pressure,” I suggest.

“What?” Bayzli snaps.

“Firm pressure will stop the bleeding—”

“I don’t need your help!”

I shrug and finish righting the table.  I could let the Cark spill and the plate of fruit smash across the steps, just to prove a point, but it would be wasteful.  The crystal plate comes from Jeranda and is of rare workmanship.

Behind me, the Beast growls, “You can go.”

There is real menace in his tone.

I sit back on my heels.  Why is he enraged by such a minor injury when he has muted reactions to much larger ones?   Glancing at him, I find his eyes on me.

“My Lord?”

He snatches the cloth from Bayzli and hands it me.

I fold the cloth into a square and press it firmly against the corner of his mouth with two fingers.

“A small cut,” I say gently, to lessen Bayzli’s embarrassment and the Beast’s fury.  “It doesn’t even need healing.”

Neither seems placated.  Bayzli climbs off the Throne, tears of humiliation streaking her cheeks.  She rushes from the Hall.  The Beast lets me hold the cloth against his mouth for another moment.  Then he takes it from me and tosses it onto the table.

“Next time Liaden tells one of you to do somethin’, you do it,” the Beast says coldly to the remaining women.  “Any of you have a problem following her orders, get the fuck out now.”

I can only hide my shock by busying myself with tucking my unneeded blow-pipe back into my sleeve.  Why give me such authority over these women when he plans to replace me with one of them?  I cannot fathom his designs.

“Guess I’ll stick to tea,” the Beast grumbles.  “Widema.”

Fifteen cups of tea later, the line of women on the bottom step has dwindled.  Widema’s cup of Mandoreki Gold was passable, as was Avalyn’s skillfully mixed ginger and sweetberry.  Not so with Emely’s cup of Veridian Green, or Nimesha’s spiced orange.  Several of the women have followed Bayzli’s tearful exit.  Perhaps it is the edge of discomfort from his injury that has shortened the Beast’s temper.  Whatever the cause, he snaps at the women, turning coldly critical of minute mistakes, in a way he never is with me.  Even his rebuke for my game-playing with Vaako was mild in comparison to the censure he heaps on these Aspirants.  I sit, and watch, and wonder.  If he has no patience for their small errors, why continue the test?  What is he testing?  Surely it is not their aptitude at making tea.

Finally, the Beast calls the last Aspirant, young Zetany, up the steps.  She is shaking before she even reaches the top step.  Is it fear that makes her shake, or just the discomfort of sitting so long on the cold stone steps of the Throne?

“Lord—” I begin, worried about letting the girl handle scalding liquids when she is so unsteady.

The Beast slants his eyes at me, and I see the ice-white glitter of anger dance through them.  It is not just impatience; he is still furious with me.  I bite down on my next words and seal them in the vault of my mouth.

“Tired of the test already, Liaden?”

His tone is as harsh as it has been with any of the erring Aspirants.  I bow my head slightly.

“No, my Lord.  I am at your disposal.”

He grunts, a marginally approving sound, and turns to look at Zetany as she climbs onto the left flange of the Throne.

She prepares the tea competently.  Her hands shake as she measures the nettle mix and whisks, but she seems to be gaining some composure as she strains out the leaves.

And then, disaster.

She rises up onto her knees to hand him the cup.  Shaking and unsteady, she sticks out her rear as a counterbalance as she leans towards him.

Directly into the downward curving spine of the Tree of Pain behind her.

The sharp spike jabs her.  Zetany yelps.  And she drops the teacup into the Beast’s lap.

I have a moment of hope.  A moment where I think that the impossible will happen and the cup will land upright between his thighs.  Or that either of us will succeed in our desperate grab for it.

But then the splash of the hot tea reaches my ears.  Followed by the Beast’s hiss and the girl’s wail.  He jerks backwards to try to avoid the scalding spill.  The cup shatters on the stone chair.

I close my eyes and press my lips together.

The sound of the girl’s sobbing makes me open my eyes, start forward to help salvage the unsalvageable.  She’s mopping madly at his lap, scattering shards of crystal everywhere.  A glance shows me that most of the tea splashed on his Dyneemal tunic.  His expression is bemused, not pained as it would be if he’d been scalded in such a delicate region.

“Stop, stop,” I say.  “Look at him.  He’s not burned.  Take your time.  Do it calmly.”

I gather a handful of linens.  Zetany is sobbing brokenly now, mopping through such a veil of tears she surely cannot see anything.  I sweep the linens between his legs, carefully scooping the crystal pieces into second handful of cloth.

“There now,” I say.  “Calmly.  Stop crying.  You mustn’t let your lord see you cry over such a small mistake.”

The Beast’s eyes snap to mine.  “No, Liaden?”

He is reminding me of my tears after Aimi’s death.  I need no reminding.  And that was not a small mistake.

“A concubine might share her pain with a _friend_ ,” I say, choosing my words carefully.  “But she should not show her lord her grief.  It is a dereliction of her duty.  Only her lord’s pain should bring her tears.”

The Beast’s brow furrows for a moment, and then he parses through my words and his eyes soften.  He strokes my hair.  “That so?” he asks, his deep rumble gentle.

“Yes, my Lord.  Would you like me to fetch you clean clothes?”

The Beast grins suddenly.  “Rather have a bath.”

I smile back.  I relish his baths, too.  But what of the test?  Is it over?  The five women whose tea he found passable still sit on the bottom step of the Throne.  What of them?

He turns to the weeping girl at his left hand.  “You need a healer?”

She is crying so hard, she cannot answer him.

The Beast reaches out and cups her chin in his hand.  “Zetany,” he says softly.  “You need a healer?”

“N-no, Lord Marshal.”

He wipes a tear off her cheek with his thumb.  I do not miss the way his thumb caresses her jaw.  Something hot stabs through my chest and I glance away.

“You come along.”

Surely I could not have heard him correctly.  My eyes dart back and I find him smiling gently at the girl.  Is he mad?  He dismissed lovely Nimesha and useful Cays but will keep this walking disaster for further consideration?

Completely at a loss, I can only follow him as he rises.  He holds out his elbow for me and leads me down the steps.  Still snuffling, Zetany trails us.  At the bottom of the steps, the remaining five part to let us through.  The Beast nods at them and they rise to follow us.  From their expressions, I can see they are as puzzled as I am.

A silent, wondering group, we follow the Beast through the Hall.


	23. Chapter 23

In the sanctum, we part company from our silent train.  Caden, more cautious than I, insists on checking each of the women for weapons before he admits them into the sanctum.  I give him a wink and a smile as I glide past him on the Beast’s arm.

Nazya also remains in the outer chamber, and I wonder what sort of inspection my handmaiden plans to subject the Aspirants to.  She radiates disapproval, although she says nothing.  Is it that she dislikes the selection process and those who have presented themselves for choosing?  Or have I somehow betrayed my rift with the Beast and led Nazya to suspect that one of these women will replace me?  I don’t know her well enough yet to guess.

Caden closes the inner doors behind us, and the Beast and I are alone.  For the first time since he told me to prove myself to him.  Have I succeeded in proving anything?  I glance at his face uncertainly, but his expression has gone remote, and his ice-white eyes tell me nothing.

“Get changed, Liaden.”

I bow my head.  “Would you like your robe?”

“Yeah.”

Undressing him is slow torture.  Each expanse of bared skin scores a fresh weal on my heart.  To see his beauty and know that I may never have the right to touch him again, to make love with him again, is physically painful.  To look at him and think of one of the women in the outer chamber in his arms makes my stomach churn.  My chest is so tight by the time I slip the robe over his wide shoulders and fasten the clasp at his waist that I can barely breathe.

Trying to ease the ache, I press my fist between my breasts as I move away from him, towards my own chamber.  I do not want to wet the beautiful white gown and risk ruining it.  It is imbued with bitter-sweet memories, and I will take it with me, even if the Beast does not choose me again.  I will not see one of the six who wait in the outer chamber wearing it.

I feel his eyes on me, a weight between my shoulder-blades, before he speaks.

“You okay?”

I glance back over my shoulder at him.  “Yes, my Lord.”

“You want to stop the test?”

It takes every ounce of control I have to keep my voice steady as I reply, “If you are ready to make your choice.”

The Beast’s eyes flick over my face.  I cannot read anything in them.  If he chooses now, will he choose me?  I don’t know.  I swallow hard against the tightness in my chest.

“Rather narrow it down some more,” he says.

Relief mingles with tension in my breast.  He has not chosen me, but he has not chosen one of the others, either.  “As my Lord wishes.”

He nods and I continue towards my chamber.  Over the rustle of my gown, I just catch his murmur, “Wish you’d call me Riddick.”

 _Choose me and I’ll call you anything you want_.  I swallow the words before they escape my throat.  If he is not ready to choose me, I will not beg or bargain with him.  He told me to prove myself and I will.  Although I do not know how yet . . .

Hanging up the white dress, I select a set of bathing robes from among those Fainche left me.  Thinner and more closely fitted than the robes I usually wear, they show off the curves of my body.  It cannot hurt to remind him of what he would be giving up if he chooses one of the others.  Perhaps he misses my body as much as I miss his.

I brush my hair and leave it in a dark cloud around my shoulders and down my back.  The Rift clasp goes on one of the robe’s thin shoulder straps like a brooch.  It is the only weapon I take into the bath, and I want it close at hand.

When I rejoin him in the sanctum, the six women have passed my allies’ inspection and cluster around the Beast.  The redhead, Nadie, shakes back her vibrant mane and touches his sleeve as she says something to him.  The Beast smiles faintly at her, but his eyes track to me as I emerge from my chamber.  He holds out his hand to me, forcing Nadie to step aside.

His gaze, softened to blue-white, slides down over me, and his smile broadens.  He draws me against his side and drops his mouth to my ear.  “You tryin’ to embarrass me?”

Nonplussed, I look up at him.  “No.”

He grins.  “Good thing this robe’s loose.  C’mon.”

Without enlightening me any further, he leads the way into the Chamber of the Bath.  The Servants have come and gone, invisible, efficient, and there is no sign that I cleaned Aimi’s body here only a few hours ago.

 _Make sure he’s not alone_ , she said.  I promised her that I would, but it was the Beast who made good on my promise.  Through my tension and uncertainty, I feel a rush of gratitude towards him.

Leaning close so that the others do not overhear, I whisper, “Thank you for choosing Chione for Toal.  She will be kind to him.”

The Beast frowns briefly.  “Thought you might not like me replacin’ your friend.”

“Aimi would want him to be cared for.”  If I were as unselfish as Aimi, that would be my foremost concern, too.  That the Beast be well-cared for.  But I am not so unselfish.

And deep down, I don’t believe that anyone can care for him as well as I.

Slipping from his side, I open the hidden cabinet.  I gather soaps and sponges and pass them out to the six Aspirants.  Zetany immediately drops hers.  I control my expression carefully as I help her retrieve the rolling sponge.  What does the Beast see in this clumsy child?

When I straighten, I see that Daliane the Navigator and Nadie have not exercised the same control.  Daliane covers a smirk with her fingertips while Nadie rolls her eyes.  Zetany’s brown eyes fly from one face to another, and her cheeks flush.

Rage stiffens my spine.  Zetany is nervous enough.  She does not need their mockery to undermine her fragile self-possession.  Putting my arm around the girl would show my support, but it might undo her.  Instead, I lift my chin and fix Daliane and Nadie with a withering stare.  Zetany follows my example a moment later.

From behind us, the Beast suddenly growls, “Daliane, you can go.”

I start.  How did he slide into the bath so silently?  And how did he see such subtle interplay occurring across the chamber from him?  Truly, his silver eyes miss nothing.

I glance at Nadie, expecting the Beast to dismiss her as well.  But evidently he has missed her mockery, for he says nothing to her, and she quickly rearranges her contemptuous expression into a neutral smile.  He nods at the side of the bath and Nadie leads the five remaining women around the bath to sit in a row on his right side.

Grinding my teeth, I go to kneel at his left side.

Nadie dips her sponge in the water and runs it across his broad shoulder.  Her smile, gone suggestive, bares teeth that chew through my heart.  I have to look away, to focus on the sponge I clench between my fists.  This is wrong, _wrong_.  Bathing is our ritual, the Beast’s and mine.  It is foul to have these women, these interlopers, invade our sacred space.

“Liaden, show ‘em how it’s done,” the Beast says suddenly.

I glance up at him.  Fury flashes hot through me.  _He_ invited these women here.  He broke open our private game and exposed it to them, as he exposes his body to them.  I would never bare myself to another man except in his defense, and he casually disrobes in front of not one but _five_ women.

The Beast meets my eyes and his eyes narrow.  His mouth thins down to a white line.  Then he smiles, the cold, cruel smile he wore when he first took the Throne.  The smile of a victor.

He stretches his left hand out to me.  “Ain’t this where you usually start?”

The temptation to throw the sponge in his face is overwhelming.  But it would prove nothing; certainly not my loyalty.  Taking a deep breath, I wet my sponge, lather it, and carefully wash his fingers.

“The Lord Marshal’s bath should be a time of repose,” I say to the Aspirants, instructing them as Fainche instructed me.  “Set the tone through routine.  Start always by washing the fingertips, making sure to clean the nails.  Then the knuckles, the wrist.  Remember that there are two sides to every surface.  Turn his hand over and wash the palm.  Keep your eyes downcast; your head bowed.  If the Lord Marshal wishes to speak, he will speak.  Otherwise, let this be a time of quiet for him.”

I glance up to see how the Aspirants are taking this instruction and find all eyes on me.  The Beast’s glint quicksilver, and he leans toward me, lifting his right knee so his groin is shielded from the row of women sitting on his far side.

The bathing has begun to arouse him.

“I like it better when you’re not quiet,” he murmurs to me.  “An’ when you’re wearin’ less.”

Heat floods my cheeks, as he no doubt intended, and I quickly drop my gaze back to his arm.

I reach for routine as a distraction.  “Rinse out your sponge frequently,” I say.  “Wash up the arm to the shoulder, paying special attention to the elbow.  If there is rough skin on the elbow, use pumice or a mild abrasive to take it off.”

I hold up a file to demonstrate.  Daring to look up again, I find Nadie copying me on the Beast’s far side.  The Beast ignores her, and continues to watch me, his eyes glinting.

“Thought you liked it rough,” he whispers to me.

I grit my teeth.  He’s baiting me, and I will not rise to his taunts.  But, oh, how I long to.  How I long to throw my sponge in his face and rage at him.  I have erred, but not so gravely that he needs to torment me this way.  Not so gravely that he needs to invite strangers into our sanctum.  And not so gravely that he needs to humiliate me in front of them.

“Rinse out your sponge again before cleaning the underarm.  Make sure to wash the area thoroughly to address any unpleasant smell.”

The Beast sniffs mockingly.  “You sayin’ I stink, Liaden?”

Nadie and blonde Havilly giggle in response.

I ignore all of them.  “Rinse your sponge after cleaning the underarm.  Then wash the shoulder.  Clean out any fresh injuries, but do not disturb wounds that have already set.”  I demonstrate, sponging around a closed scratch on his shoulder.  “Try to make your actions flow.  Don’t startle the Lord Marshal with sudden movements.”

“Nice an’ slow,” the Beast whispers to me.  “It’s worth the wait.”

He repeats _that_ in front of these interlopers?  His words while making love to me?  That is too much.  I will not have it.

I lift my head and hiss at him.

His eyes glint and he leans back against the bath’s padding.

“Widema, you give it a try,” he rumbles, without glancing at the women on his right.

They shuffle, the pilot replacing Nadie at the Beast’s right hand.  I watch her closely – to avoid the Beast’s amused gaze – while she bathes him competently.  But she is clearly uncomfortable with the process.  Her face is white, her lips pinched, and she focuses her blue eyes so intently on the small patch of skin she’s cleaning that I’m surprised her gaze doesn’t blister his skin.

I feel a twinge of sympathy for her.  The idea of bathing a naked man – a man who would be my master – was alien to me, too, when I first came to this place.  Nothing so personal as bathing was asked of me on Tarenge.  Only when I came to the Basilica, and Zhylaw put the Collar on me, did I have to perform such intimate duties.

But it is a Concubine’s duty to serve as her lord requires, and if Widema wants to be the Beast’s concubine, she will have to learn to serve.  As I have learned.

Despite Widema’s competence, the Beast says to her, “You can go.  Come see me tomorrow after training.  I got something in mind for you.”

Relief lightens Widema’s brow, brings color to her cheeks, before she controls her expression.  “Yes, Lord Marshal.  Thank you.”

The Beast nods at her.  When she rises, he tips his head to motion the next in line forward.

Zetany takes Widema’s place at the edge of the bath.

Without thinking, I cringe.  Then I still myself fiercely.  She can do no damage to him with sponge and soap.  And if she applies the file to something tender, it is no more than he deserves.

I smile encouragingly at her.

She gives me a tremulous nod and dunks her sponge in the water.  Her hands shake while she lathers the sponge, but she seems to gather confidence as she washes the Beast’s hand without incident.  She soaps his arm energetically and I relax.  She is young, untrained, but her enthusiasm is genuine.  Perhaps that is what the Beast sees in her.

Perhaps her youthful enthusiasm is more of a threat to my position than Nadie’s wiles.

My eyes slide to the redhead, and then back to Zetany’s brown curls, bent studiously over her task.

No, whatever it is the Beast sees in her, whatever it is about her that appeals to him, I cannot see her as a threat.  She could be a protégé, even a friend . . .

“That’s very good, Zetany,” I say gently.

She looks up and gives me a brilliant smile, uninhibited and authentic.  It draws an answering smile from me.  Applying herself again, she rinses off the Beast’s arm and dips both soap and sponge back into the water.  The Beast closes his eyes and lifts his arm obligingly.

Zetany leans over the bath, stretching to reach his underarm.  She is so small and the bath so large that it is an effort for her.  She overbalances, teeters and my breath catches.  But she reaches down hastily to balance herself on the bath’s padded rim.

A small sigh of relief escapes me.

Her hand, slick with soap, slips off the rim of the bath.  For a second, her eyes, gone wide with shock and dismay, meet mine.

Then she topples into the bath.

I turn my head to avoid the spray.

Warm water slaps across the bare skin of my chest and arms.  The sound of water hitting marble underscores Zetany’s wail and the Beast’s growl.  Sodden exclamations from the other women add to the cacophony.

Amidst the noise, I reach into the bath and begin lifting Zetany off the Beast.  He hands her out to me silently, but I can read his annoyance in his precise movements, in the set of his mouth.  He does not look at Zetany, does not direct any of that irritation at her.  Instead, as he heaves himself out of the bath, he glares at me.

I wrap a towel around the shivering girl before returning his glare.  Why direct his ire at me?  I wasn’t the one who fell on him.

The Beast crosses his arms over his chest and glowers.

“Havilly,” I say to the woman who looks least soaked.  “Could you get the Lord Marshal a towel?”

“Get out,” the Beast growls.  He doesn’t turn his head or look at them, but there is no question as to whom he means to go.  And whom he doesn’t.

In silence punctuated only by the rustling of towels and wet gowns, the four remaining Aspirants shuffle out of the chamber.  The Beast continues to watch me, his head tilted slightly to the side, his mouth thinned to a white line, while the women leave.  I give Zetany an encouraging pat as she heads toward the door.

When the door closes behind her, I take a dry towel off the rack and drape it over my arm.  “Would you like to fight before or after I dry you off?” I ask.

“Liaden—”

The warning growl.  But I am beyond his warnings, and beyond his anger.  He told me to prove myself to him, but there is no proving love, as there is no proving loyalty.  They _are_.  And if he does not believe either of me, after all we have been through in the last three days, then perhaps I have no place at his side.

“Have you narrowed it down sufficiently, my Lord?”  I offer him the towel coolly.  “Would you like me to call the Aspirants back so you can announce your choice?”

His lips thin further, so the edges of his teeth show between them.  “You sure I won’t pick one of them?”

My throat tightens at the thought, but I force my words past the ligature.  “No, I’m not.  I am never sure with you.  But I will take the chance to end this.  To stop you from exposing any more of what lies between us – of what should be _private_ between us – to _them_.”

My voice breaks on the last word and I turn away from him hastily.  I don’t want him to see anything but righteous indignation.  Not the pain he’s caused me.  After all this time amongst the courtiers, I should be able to hide my hurt from him.  But it is too raw, and I fear he will see it.  With those eyes that miss nothing.

“Liaden,” he says softly.

I shake my head.  If I turn back now, he will see my tears.

He takes the towel out of my hand.  I listen to him dry himself, to the sound of the towel moving over the sleek golden skin that I see too clearly in my mind’s eye, while I cast around the cold marble of the chamber, seeking a point, any point, to fix on and distract me from the pain in my heart.

“Think any of them would die for me?” he asks, his words punctuated by the slither of silk on skin as he slides into his robe.

I shrug.  I don’t know any of them well enough to judge.  “I cannot say.”

“Would you still?”

“Yes,” I answer, without hesitation.

“That’s what I’m tryin’ to avoid,” he says.  I hear him pivot on his heel.  Turning to look, I see that he has moved silently to the door.  “Come down to the throne room, when you’re ready.”

 

I pace around the bath, kicking my damp, clinging skirts away from my legs, delaying until I am sure that he will have left the sanctum.

 _That’s what I’m trying to avoid_.  He wants to keep me safe.  But I am nowhere so safe as by his side.  He sees so much, misses nothing.  Why can’t he see that?

And what of my plea to name an Heir and accompany me to Furya, where we both could be safe?  Has it fallen on deaf ears?  Is he still considering it?  I cannot tell.

Sure that I will find the sanctum empty, I steal down the corridor and through the adjoining door.  The chill I feel whenever he is not near tells me that I was right.  He’s gone.  And yet I feel a faint disappointment not to find him here.

Disappointment sharpens to pain when I see his discarded robe draped over the edge of the bed.  One of _them_ must have dressed him.

I press the heel of my hand against my breastbone.  A sharp ache there draws my eyes down.  Amongst the fading marks of his claiming, an oblate bruise mars the pale skin between my breasts, where I have pressed my hand so often of late.  To ease the pain he’s caused me.

Unaccountable anger stiffens my spine.  The marks of his claiming still darken my skin and he would choose another?  He demands I prove my loyalty to him, but he has none.  He torments me with reminders of what I have lost while he _auditions_ women to replace me?

Enough.

Shaking with rage, I stalk into my chamber.  I tear off my wet bathing robes and reach into my wardrobe, intending to draw out one of my gray gowns, and, suitably armored, go down to the Great Hall to face him.

A black scalecloth gown hangs at the front of the rack.  I reach past it, but then pause.  Something draws my hand back.

Aimi.

I draw the gown out of the closet.  It is one of the three that Aimi took for her union ceremony, I am sure.  How did it end up back in my wardrobe?

 _Make sure he’s not alone_.

Her voice whispers through my chamber, echoing slightly the way it did in the bath.

I clutch the gown to my chest.  “Aimi,” I breathe.  “It’s not the same.  He’s sending me away.  Toal would never have sent you away.”

 _Make sure he’s not alone_.

Her voice is so clear this time that I can hear her faint inflection on the final word.

“What are you saying?” I cry aloud.  Should I step aside?  Should I go to Furya and leave him in the care of one of _them_?  Bumbling Zetany?  She cannot be trusted with a sponge, much less one of my pins.  Scheming Nadie?  So intent on seduction, would she even notice the many dangers he faces?

I draw the gown on slowly, wondering, waiting for some other sign.  But there is none.  Aimi has given me whatever guidance she can.  And Xia has already spoken.  I offer a quick prayer for strength as I fasten up the front closure of the gown.

Turning towards the sanctum, I catch sight of myself in the mirror.  My reflected eyes widen in surprise.  Aimi had the gown altered after all.  Of the original, staid scalecloth, only two panels remain, one in front, one in back, barely wide enough for modesty.  The sides and sleeves have been replaced by fabric so diaphanous it is no more than a smoky veil over my skin.  The original neckline has been widened so it bares my upper chest.  In the back, it rises to a stiff collar that frames my shoulders.  The back of the dress has been replaced by more of the sheer black fabric, revealing my body from shoulders to waist.

I twist to better see what is exposed by the dress.  The segmented tail of the Collar still bisects my back, silver under smoke.  But instead of the pale flesh I am used to seeing around that ribbon of silver, three red marks spread across my back.  Two lie just under my shoulder blades, a third lower, across my ribs.  The marks start small at my spine and flare towards my sides, splaying like fingers, or wings.

Wings.  The Beast called me an angel and now I wear di’an marks like red wings across my back.  A blood angel.

 _His_ angel.  I gained these marks in his defense.  I killed to protect him.  What more tangible proof of my loyalty does he require?

 _Make sure he’s not alone_ , Aimi said.

 _Be ever his good right hand_ , Xia said.

 _Prove it_ , he said.

 _Enough_.  No more testing.  I will not leave him in the hands of amateurs.  I am his right hand.  We are safer together than we are apart.  That is what I must prove to him, not my love or my loyalty.

Shaking my hair over the di’an marks, I walk out of the sanctum.

Caden rises from his seat beside the Inner Doors when I open them.  Nazya also rises, from kneeling next to his chair.  Seeing me, Caden’s face goes fiery and Nazya’s cheeks stain faintly pink.  Is my gown so revealing that it embarrasses them?

I raise an eyebrow at Nazya.

“You’ll need your cloak, mistress,” she says.

She’s right, of course.  Whether or not the dress is sufficient for modesty, I shouldn’t walk the halls of the Basilica in it.  The Beast may not be the only one among the Legion Vast who knows what the di’an marks are.

I give her a grateful nod.

While she disappears back into the sanctum, Caden sputters, “Are you angry, Lady Liaden?”

Very.  But not at him.  “No, Caden.  You’ve done nothing wrong.  I appreciate your assistance.”

He turns, if possible, even redder.  “I meant about me and Nazya, Lady.”

Caden and Nazya?  Did I misunderstand the reason behind their blushes?  I quickly rearrange my moue of surprise into a smile.

“Does she make you happy, Caden?” I ask gently.

He flushes purple.  “Yes, but—”

“And do you make her happy?”

“She says so, but—”

“Then I’m happy for you both.  I don’t hold with what the purifiers say about happiness in this ‘Verse.”  I don’t hold with anything the purifiers say anymore, but he does not need to know that.  “Enjoy whatever happiness you can find in each other.”  Thinking of Aimi with a faint pang, I continue.  “I hope it lasts a long time.  ‘Til UnderVerse come.”

Caden nearly glows with gratitude.  “Thank you, Lady.”

I hear Nazya’s soft, returning footfall a moment before she drapes a gray cloak over my shoulders.  “Thank you, Nazya.  And thank you, Caden, for watching over me so well.  I count on the two of you.  Your loyalty, and your discretion.”

As she rounds my side, Nazya gives Caden an arch glance.  “You told her.”

“I—”  Caden turns so purple I’m afraid he might strangle on his embarrassment.

“Lady Liaden fights for her position today.  She doesn’t need any distractions.”  Nazya hands me a deathshead pin and reaches under the cloak to set its mate into my collar.

I smile ruefully at her.  She is, in her own way, as perceptive as the Beast.  “I wish I’d had you with me yesterday, Nazya.  Perhaps things would be different today if I had.”

“I’m with you today,” she says with an unassuming authority that she seems to have put on along with her new gown and keys.  “And I will be with you tomorrow, whatever comes.”

Her loyalty makes my throat tight.  “Thank you, Nazya.”

“The Lord Marshal waits for you in the Great Hall.  He dismissed the giggly one, Havilly, so only three remain.”  She looks up from arranging my hair over the collar of the cloak and holds my eyes.  “You’re worth more than all of them put together, mistress.”

Tears prick my eyes at her earnest devotion.  What have I done to deserve this?

And it finally hits me, the source of the Beast’s disbelief.  I have proven my loyalty to him, again and again.  That is not why he doubts.

He doesn’t believe he’s worthy of it.

The realization stiffens my spine, squares my shoulders.  “Come,” I say to my allies.  “Let’s finish this.”

Nazya and Caden fall into step behind me as I stalk through the outer chamber and out to the Lord’s Walk.  Today I do not take the stairs, and risk falling in my high heels.  We ride down in the magnelift, and the small group of technicians waiting for the lift when we arrive on the main level of the Basilica draw out of my way with bowed heads.

The Elites guarding the doors to the Great Hall open them for me without a word.  As I pass through them, Nazya’s soft hand brushes my shoulder.  She tugs the cloak free, so swiftly and neatly it doesn’t even break my stride.

I feel Nazya and Caden fall back, and the doors close silently behind me, sealing me within the near-silent tomb of the Basilica.  I focus my attention ahead, on the Hall’s four occupants, clustered together at the base of the Throne.

The Beast sits on the top step, behind the hover table of food.  The three remaining Aspirants – Nadie, Zetany and Avalyn – sit around him, eating and speaking to him in low voices.

Seeing them sitting so companionably makes my stomach curdle.

Only the Beast seems aware of my entrance.  His silver eyes flick to me and then back to Nadie as she says something to him.  His mobile mouth stretches into a smile.

He’s had sufficient warning.

I stalk forward until I am within throwing distance and snap the pins out of my collar.  Taking careful aim, I hurl them, one after another, directly at him.

They slam into the table on either side of his plate.

Nadie shrieks and backpedals like a crab away from the pin quivering a few centimeters from her plate.  On the Beast’s other side, Zetany drops the goblet she holds, splashing Cark across the table.  She, too, backs away from the pin.  Only Avalyn reacts as a warrior should, rising and snatching a knife off the table.  But she does not move to protect the Beast.

None of them would die for him.

I stop and say into the stillness that follows Nadie’s screams, “There is your answer.”

The Beast’s eyes rise from the pins driven into the wood on either side of his plate.  The muscles of his bare chest and shoulders flex, but his tone is mild when he says, “Inventive, Liaden.”

“Thank you.”  I sink into an obeisance.  “I await my Lord Marshal’s choice.”

“Do you?  Hmm.”  The Beast is silent for a moment, and I rise from my obeisance to gauge his expression.  His eyes glitter like ice.  A cold rage, to cover the fear he must feel.  Fear he showed me once.  I failed to appreciate its depths, or the lengths to which he’d go to staunch it.  “Maybe I need to narrow it down some more.”

What more does he need?  I would die for him; they would not.  He is safe with no one but me at his side.

While I’m wondering what else he wants, he rises and sits heavily on the Throne.  Spreading his knees, he glowers down at me.

“Zetany,” he growls, without looking at her.  “Kneel.”  He nods at the space between his booted feet.

A cold sweat breaks out on my skin.  He would not . . .

The girl pales at his harsh command, but she slides across the top step and kneels obediently in front of him.  Nadie and Avalyn stare at the tableau, their expressions perfect mirrors of shock.  Can they guess what’s coming?  I school my expression more carefully, but feel my eyes narrow.  What is he thinking?  Is he truly going to let the clumsy child’s teeth anywhere near his genitals?

“D’you want me to choose you?” he says to Zetany, his voice deceptively soft.

Zetany nods, brown curls bobbing.  “More than anything,” she whispers, a sound that carries in the silent, still Hall.

My hands curl into fists at my sides.  Is this the final test?  Will he force Zetany to pleasure him, right here in front of me?  Does he think I’ll endure watching that?

“Show me,” he says.

Something tears in my chest.  No.

Zetany’s nervous gulp rings in the silent Hall, but she reaches out and begins fumbling with the clasp on his trousers.

No no no no no.  I will not stand by and watch another woman touch him.

I move towards the Throne and his eyes lift from Zetany’s curls to me.  The coldness there sears me, but does not stop me.  Finally, I can read something other than rage in his eyes.  Fear, despair, hopelessness.  He believes himself unlovable, and so he drives away those he loves.  To protect them, and to protect himself.

No longer.

I run up the stairs, my heels clacking on the stone, and slam the hover table out of my path.

“Stop this!”  I shout at him.

His hand sinks into Zetany’s curls and he shoves her head down towards where she’s still trying to open his pants.  She makes a sound very close to a sob.

“Enough,” I hiss.  “Stop the test, Riddick.”

His ice-white eyes flicker.  “You givin’ up?”

Breathing hard from exertion and emotion, I plant my hands on the Throne’s arms and lean over Zetany, so my face is only a hand’s-breadth from his.  “You are worthy of everything I have given you.”

His eyes drop to Zetany’s curls.  “You don’t know anything about me.”

“I know enough,” I insist.  “I know you are capable of great kindness as well as this cruelty.  I know you have had to be strong, in body and in mind, because those around you have been weak.  I know that the heart that beats in here.”  I place my palm against his bare chest, flattening my hand against his warm skin.  “Feels more than rage and hatred.  You are capable of love, and of being loved.  If you would let yourself.  If you would take the risk and fight to keep those who love you, instead of forcing them away.”

His mouth tightens and I know his next words will be in that warning growl.  “You’re safer away from me.”

I shake my head insistently.

“I would rather die tomorrow, with you, at your side, having had only these three days, than live three more years without you.”

The chest under my hand rises and falls raggedly.  He keeps his gaze fixed on Zetany’s head, and I know it is because he cannot meet my eyes.  His jaw works, but he says nothing.

“Riddick,” I say, repeating his name despite the twinge it gives me, knowing it is the way to reach him.  “Please, look at me.”

When his burning gaze snaps up to mine, I whisper, “Tell me that you would choose one of them because they will serve you better than I have.  Because you trust them more.  Because you want them more than you want me.”  My voice fails at the thought of one of them taking my place in his arms.  I continue in a whisper, all I can force past the constriction of my throat.  “And I will step aside.  Tell me any of that, and I’ll go to Furya without another word.  But please, please don’t send me away just because you fear losing me.  And don’t do this.”  I glance down at the girl cowering between us.  “Just to drive me away.”

He lets out his breath explosively, and releases Zetany’s head.  The girl rocks back, her shoulders bumping against my thighs.  Her whole body jerks and she makes an odd sound deep in her throat.  Holding his eyes, waiting for his response, I reach down absently to touch her shoulder.

She claps her hand across her mouth.  A startling sound in the silent Hall.  She looks up, her eyes filling with tears, and I start to say something to soothe her.

Then her body jerks again and I realize she’s not sobbing.  My hand freezes, hovering above her shoulder.

Oh, no.

She makes a terrible sound behind her hand.  A retching sound.  I step back, but not fast enough.

With a wet heave, she vomits convulsively, spraying partially digested fruit across my thighs.

Across Aimi’s dress.

Zetany begins keening, rocking back and forth on her hands and knees.  Her wailing fills the Hall, the only sound in the shocked silence.

With a tired sigh, I shrug out of the gown.  There’s no purpose in standing in a ruined dress, stinking of bile and spattered with effluvia.  Better to be naked and clean.  I wad the worst of the mess into the skirt and wipe the step with the hem.  Then I toss the dress onto the hover table and stand naked in front of the Beast.

He leans over and pats Zetany’s back awkwardly as she continues to rock back and forth, keening like a demented hound.  Despite what she’s just done, my heart goes out to her.  How terrified must she be to have vomited purely out of nerves?

Ignoring my nakedness, I kneel in front of her.  “Zetany, stop. It’s all right.”

The Beast slides off the Throne and crouches next to me, putting his arm around Zetany’s shoulders.  “Go clean up and get your things,” he says quietly to her.  “Avalyn, Nadie, you too.”

The two other women rise, looking stunned both by what they have witnessed and their good fortune.  With a wet snuffle, Zetany stops howling and looks up at the Beast through her tears.

“You-you mean—” she begins.

“Yeah.  Go on.”

I try to smile at Zetany when she rises, but my heart is shattering, shattering into a thousand ragged pieces.  Not one.  Three.  Three to serve him better than I.  To love him better than I.

He has made his choice.

I rock back on my heels and begin to rise.  My legs will not hold me and I grip the flange of the Throne for support.  My breath comes in broken gasps, all I can manage through the terrible bloody wreckage circling like a hurricane in my chest.

I’ve almost managed to pull myself to my feet when the Beast grabs my wrist.

“Wait,” he growls, not looking at me.

Uncomprehending, I sink back onto my knees and stare at his stern profile.  Wait for what?  So he can dismiss me again?  Order me to Furya again?  I’ve heard those commands once.  I don’t need to hear them again.  He’s made his decision plain.

Distantly, I hear the thud of the Great Doors closing.

He turns his head slowly and looks at me.

Then in a blur, he’s moving, surging upwards on those powerful legs, dragging me with him, clasping me to his chest, and I am in his lap, feeling the rough slide of his trousers under my thighs as he shoves them down, replacing the leatheren with the silken heat of his skin.  He releases my wrist only to close his huge hand around my hip and slam me down on him.

I scream with the shock of his brutal, bruising penetration.  My hands scrabble for leverage, against the back of the Throne, against his shoulders, to push away from him, to escape his sudden invasion, but he holds me tight, not letting me go, breathing hard into my hair.

His hand sweeps up the metal spine of the Collar, fists in my hair, dragging my head back until he can look into my eyes.  His have incandesced, rage and doubt and fear and his terrible, desperate need igniting into an emotion so powerful I worry for his sanity.

That emotion stabs through me, stops my struggles and holds me still in his arms, despite my instinct to fight free of him.

Any denial now will be irrevocable.  I see it in his face, feel it in the tension of his body.  He expects me to reject this assault.  He _wants_ me to, to justify his decision to send me away.

To prove that he is unlovable.

The trap he’s set yawns before me.  All I have to do is deny him, push away, voice one word of rejection, and he will turn away from me.  Perhaps forever.

No, I understand him better now.

Cupping his head in my hands, I push myself down on him, taking him fully into my body.  I’m not ready for him, and his thickness stretches me painfully.  Gritting my teeth against the discomfort, I whisper to him.  “No, I will not let you go.”

Remorse sheets through him, dulls his eyes to pewter.

He begins to lift me off him.

I wrap my arms around his neck and resist the force of his hands, seating myself on him firmly.  As my inner muscles adjust to him, the discomfort eases, and I feel the first swirl of that familiar fire.  “No.”

“Liaden—”  He turns his head, exposing the column of his throat.

I cannot let him turn away from me.  Not now.

I bite down, hard, on his neck’s long tendon.

“Fuck!”

He jerks his head back, leaving blood on my teeth.  His eyes blaze and his body surges within mine.  With bruising force, his hands close on my hips.

I could let him take me like this.  Angry and rough.  I sense that there could be pleasure in it as well as pain and punishment.  But I can’t let him.  The remorse I just saw in his eyes will follow the passion, and deepen his conviction that he is too monstrous to be loved.

An unlovable Beast.

I cup his head in my hands again, holding him still while I brush my mouth across his.  Softly.  Light touches of my lips and tongue.  Giving him those tender kisses he taught me.  With which he tamed me, feral in my own way after so many years of neglect by Zhylaw.

He stiffens, a moment of resistance.  Then he responds.  His mouth opens under mine; his hands flex on my skin, changing from that hurtful grasp to a gentle stroking.  While I continue to kiss him, he touches me everywhere, back and buttocks, shoulders and hips, his fingertips sweeping over me, spreading his unique fire across my skin, until I am shivering with need.

My shivering becomes a rhythm, a rolling motion that moves him within me, so deep within me in this position.  There’s no discomfort now.  Only delicious fullness and mounting delight.  I reach out and brace myself against the Throne so I can increase my pace, drive myself down on him faster and faster until I can bring us to that frenzied completion I crave.

His hands tighten on me, pull me hard against him.  “Liaden,” he whispers, impossibly deep.  “Slow down.  It’s worth the wait.”

There is no taunting now.  Only the understanding that our joining is too good to rush, no matter what the circumstances.

I give myself over to his pace, letting him guide me with his hands and hips to a slower tempo, until he is barely moving within me.  As our rhythm slows, my awareness of him expands.  Each breath that breaks inside his chest.  Each centimeter of his warm skin that rubs against mine.  Each brush of his mouth and tongue and teeth.  Each minute movement that pushes him deeper, thrusts him more insistently against my core.

“Liaden, look at me.”

My eyes, closed in pleasure, fly open.  In this position, sitting in his lap, our eyes are level, and I look directly into his brilliant gaze.  There is a question there, a need that has nothing to do with physical release.

The intensity of it makes me shudder, hard uncontrollable tremors that echo the wild fluttering building inside me.

I clasp my arms around his neck, cradling his head in my hands, and speak in words punctuated by my accelerating breathing.  “I love you, Riddick.”

“Still?” he growls.

“Always . . .”

And I lose all ability to think, to speak, to make any sound but a scream of affirmation and delight as he pushes me over the edge with the sudden hard pounding of his body into mine.  Ecstasy rolls over me, through me.  My senses fragment.  I hear a great roaring, that could be the pounding of my blood or the bass note of his release.  My sight dissolves into explosions of light and darkness.

We shudder into stillness.  I lie limp against him, too wasted by emotion and exertion to lift my head from his neck.  My legs cramp from kneeling for so long, but I can’t consider lifting myself off him yet.  He begins moving slowly, one hand rising to stroke and smooth the long fall of my hair.  The other hand touches his neck, exploring the bloodied imprint of my teeth.

“You bit me.”

He sounds bemused, his mood mercurial.  I could laugh, draw him into our familiar game.  But I don’t want to play now.  I need the truth of what is between us.

“I couldn’t think of any other way to reach you.”

He’s silent for a moment, his hand moving in my hair.  Then he whispers, so low I can barely hear him, “Were you really gonna leave me?”

Thinking of his command to wait while Zetany, Nadie and Avalyn left, I almost say _no_.  But then I realize what he’s asking.  “You dismissed me.  What choice did I have?”

“Coulda stayed.”  He rubs his cheek against my hair.  “That all you can be, Liaden?  My concubine?”

Fear flutters upward, from my belly to my breast.  What is he asking?  What more is there for me?  What have I fought so hard for if not to be his right hand?  It is what I _am_.

“I will be anything you want me to be,” I say, squeezing my eyes shut against his collarbone and trying to see anything but a future where I scrabble to be more than the mother of his child.

“Anythin’?” he asks, the low note rumble.

No, not _anything_.  There are things I will not do, depths to which I will not sink, no matter how much I love him.

“I’m not a whore,” I whisper fiercely.  “I won’t be your whore.  A convenient bed for you to visit when you wish, when you tire of your other playmates—”

He chuckles suddenly and smoothes my hair back from my face.  “Decoys, Liaden.”

His words stop the diatribe bubbling up from my belly.  “What?”

“Decoys.  Four targets instead of one.  Better odds.”

Decoys?  He went through this elaborate ruse in order to pick three _decoys_?  “Why?” I ask, bewildered.

“Why d’you think?”  His hand cups the back of my head, pressing my face against his throat.  “You wouldn’t settle for companion, huh?”

He asks me to be his companion?

I should be honored.  But disappointment knifes through me.  I am proud to be his concubine.  I would die to protect him.  Without hesitation.  Without regret.  I’m honored to devote my life to his.  Becoming his companion is a pale shadow of what I once was, and what I long to be again.

I should be satisfied with it.  It is a place in his life.  But it isn’t the place I want.

He sighs and strokes my hair.  “Guess you better give me your vow then.”

Shocked, I lift my head against the pressure of his hand.  “What?”

He smiles lazily.  “You forget it already?”

“Of course not—”  He’s teasing me.  Baiting me.  “I remember it as well as I remember your response.”

Wicked amusement flares quicksilver through his eyes.

Before he has a chance to say anything else, to antagonize me into saying something we will both regret, I say, “I swear to honor and obey you.  In Life, in Death—”

“Always,” he interrupts.

I nod, appreciating his modification.  It smacks of sacrilege to speak of the UnderVerse to him.  “Always,” I repeat.

He tilts my face down and his warm mouth brushes over each of my eyes, then presses against my forehead.  Despite the sweetness of his embrace, I feel a flare of panic.  Will he leave me vowless as before?

His lips move against my skin.  “I’ll cherish and command you, Liaden.  Always.”

My ears ring with the words that I dared not believe I would hear.  I clutch at him, wanting to pull him tighter, closer, envelope him more surely within my body.

The ringing deepens, dropping so low I can’t hear it anymore, only feel it, a tremendous, soundless vibration that grows and grows until my body can no longer contain it.  It blasts outward on a wave of light and heat that radiates from my Collar and a strange glowing mark on his chest.  Blue-white light scintillates across our joined skin.  With a crack, it becomes audible again, smashing inward through my ears and into my brain, leaving me deaf and blind for one last moment before darkness eats my senses.

 

I stand at my Lord Marshal’s right hand before the assembled court.  On the step below us, Cengis rises shakily and accepts the letheren robes of rank from the purifier Elite that gather around him.  His voice quavers as he swears to serve his Lord Marshal, the Faith and the Flock.  But his eyes never waiver from the Beast, and there is no treachery in his gaze.

He will make a good Purifier Principal.

The other purifiers keep their eyes carefully averted from me, and even Cengis squints a little against the glare.  Two days after its reawakening, my Collar still scintillates with blue-white light.  It is a hard thing to look at, the radiance spilling out of my skin.  The Beast merely grins beneath those odd goggles of his, but the rest of the court find excuses not to look at me.

How liberating to finally be free of their stares.

Free to look where I want, my eyes stray to Toal, standing to my right on the step below.  If he imagines himself standing in the Beast’s place, he gives no sign.  But even his prosaic mind must be awhirl since the Beast named him Heir yesterday.

As my mind is awhirl.

There is so much to do in the next nine weeks.  The Beast has warned me to be ready for anything, since no one has lived on Furya in our lifetimes.  I plan to take him at his word.  The Weavers already work past curfew constructing a Habitable that will protect us from any weather, be stable in an earthquake, and even float in a flood.  I’ve pressed Chef’s unused recyclers into stockpiling water and food supplies.  The Beast smiles and kisses my forehead when I tell him my plans to take a year’s worth of food and water with us, so we are not dependent on the first year’s harvest that I plan to grow.

For his part, the Beast seems to be stockpiling weapons, particularly knives.  His activity makes me wonder what our lives will be like on Furya.  Do we go to resettle a dead world, or invade it?

Everything is uncertain, even the numbers that will accompany us to Furya.  Applications began coming in as soon as the Beast named Toal his Heir, even though there’s been no formal announcement of his return to Furya.  One of the first applications was from Gennica, and hers is the only application the Beast has not yet approved.  A small shiver runs through me at the memory of his wintry expression when I questioned him about the delay.  I dare not ask again, but surely he would not leave Gennica to the mercy of what waits her in the UnderVerse?

Zhylaw . . .

The thought of joining him in unlife now sends a hard shiver down my spine.  Unimaginable, a loveless eternity with him.  How did I ever contemplate it?  Seeking reassurance, I touch my fingers to my still-flat belly and shift closer to the Beast.  He reaches out and takes my hand in his, knowing, as he did even before the Collar fed him my thoughts, what I’m feeling.  A current of warmth spreads through me.  The Collar pulses in response, a bright flare that makes those standing closest to us – the purifiers, Toal and the other commanders, Nazya to my right, and the three new Concubines on the Beast’s left side – turn their heads away.

The Beast chuckles and puts his arm around me.

Together, we watch the purifiers withdraw down the steps.  Cengis leads them, still looking overawed at the honor he’s been given, following so soon on the heels of his demotion.

Change.  It swirls all around me.  And it is only beginning.

But with the Beast’s arm around my waist, the solid heat of his body at my side, the coming changes hold no terror.  I look up at the Beast and see my smile reflected in his goggles.

“Ready?” he asks.

I nod and he leads me down the steps, toward the sanctum and our future.


End file.
